DTT,
Again, this is why I keep referring you back to the two books you have bought.
I'm not trying to be rude to you here. But your questions like the one posted about Scripture Alone reveal you do indeed lack in substantive education of basic theology. As I said you are talking a lot about a lot of things but you have not yet grasped the basic, foundational, elementary concepts of theology and doctrine. If so you would be clear on the issue of the doctrine, nature, and authenticity of Scripture.
Dolly Parton, the famous country singer and composer, had a coat she spoke about. It was called the coat of many colors. It was a patchwork of various pieces of cloth put together to make one jacket since her family was poor.
Your theology is a Dolly Parton coat of colored theology built because you are theologically poor.
Why do I say that? If you really understood the doctrine of verbal, plenary inspiration you would understand why this is the right concept of Scripture being the highest or ultimate authority. There would be no doubt in your mind. Your mind would be solid, convinced, and sure about this doctrine.
And again, this is something that you learn in the basics of an academic setting in an Evangelical Seminary or Bible College. And thus that is why it proves to me time and time again you are flopping all around with a real need to be educated in a coherent, logical, systematic fashion so that you can gain the needed skills and ideas to build a solid ideological structure to work with.
But if you just keep jumping all over the place, picking and choosing what to embrace and not embrace without having someone you submit yourself to as a mentor (or better yet several mentors who are the professors of the Seminary), which is often due to the sin pride and arrogance of one's heart wanting to be his own god and not humble to learn from one more mature than he is, then you'll continue to be confused and unsure and shallow in your mental and spiritual understanding.
And I'm not suggesting that you have to even do this in a seminary or college per se. Education can be gained outside of those circles. Some of the greatest minds in history were people who were well read and who digested the writings and ideas of other great thinkers. But there again is the issue, they were willing to submit themselves to the teachings of others through a rigorous reading of the people they wanted to learn from and study under as a disciple.
Until you decide that you want to be a disciple, one who is submitted to the instruction of another, you'll never advance very far in your theological education. This is one of the most serious epidemics in Christendom today. People are so full of pride, like Satan's heart which was filled with pride in himself, they think they do not need anyone but God and the Bible, which is so corrupt that anyone who says such understands nothing about Christ Jesus! The entire Christian life is based and built upon discipleship, the more mature educating and training the less mature so they grow up in the faith.
And again to make this truth applicable to the family, even the union of a man and woman is based upon discipleship. Any man who will not submit himself to the mature leaders Christ has given unto his church is a hypocrite if he thinks his lady in union with him ought to submit to him. How can a man, who is not submitted, ever expect his lady or ladies to be in submission to him if he does not model that type of lifestyle to the family? I find this too to be a problem among many homes. The man demands submission but he is about as ignorant as a rock, which is bad, but even worse he is not willing to do anything to overcome that ignorance and is content to be such with no desire to pursue Christ and the knowledge of Christ. And again this is why many men never find a godly woman either. A godly woman wants, desires, and is interested in a man who is full of the knowledge of Christ. A godly woman wants a man who knows and loves her Lord and has her Lord's head and heart.
Additionally, you continue to ask questions over and over that if you would take the time to read those two beginner books I suggested back to you months ago, instead of using your time to write over and over on these forums, and instead use that time you are writing to actually read from some men who are more advanced, more mature, and more knowledgable in both the word and life than you are then you would begin to grow and see many new truths, i.e. if of course you read with a mind seeking to learn instead of just reading to say one has read.
Again brother, I'm not trying to injure you here but I am being very direct that you need to get into those books and begin your theological educational journey by being a submitted disciple, i.e. if you really are serious about education and wanting to grow in grace. Without doing that you'll not have a good grasp of the major doctrines fo the Bible and how they apply to various things of life. You will bounce back and forth from one idea to another, one subject to another, and you will not be balanced. This is exactly why Apostle Paul said God gave the church teachers and other leaders (Eph. 4:11-12) so that "we may no longer be children. toosed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness in deceitful schemes" (Eph.4:14).
Until you get serious about being a disciple, and serious about reading and examining the theological literature of the God-given teachers for the body of Christ, you will remain confused and unstable and you'll continue to shift from one idea to another because you will not have a stable base from which to build from.
I have made you a clear offer in the past. I know you are trying to get your thesis done and I understand that. But even so, if you are serious about wanting to grow in your faith then I strongly urge you once again to take the time to do some serious reading and instead of jumping from one topic to another, from one question to another, with this back and forth waves of the sea flow get into those books and begin to work your way through those doctrinal subjects in a systematic fashion. If you do things like your question of how do we know the Bible alone is the ultimate truth (the meaning of Scripture alone) will become so clear to you that you'll never doubt the reason for that idea ever again and you'll be firmly convinced of God's supernatural inspiration of that one solitary book (2 Tim. 3:16). without doing so you'll forever be doomed to a wishy washy faith. And for us to answer each and every question thoroughly is not a wise use of our time with so many other pressing needs. What it might take me 6 months to explain to you in a post here post there format could be achieve in one month if you were to dig deep into the books while reading in systematic fashion. And along the way as you had questions I will be glad more than you could ever imagine to answer any questions you have after you have done your part of reading. But it is unwise, a terrible use of my time in service to the Lord, to spin in circles with anyone who is not willing to show a submitted heart to the discipleship process, which at the minimum is verified by one's willingness to follow through with on what was originally agreed (as with you reading those books and me working with you as you read). I believe you have a serious desire to know and learn DTT, or else I would have never made you the offer I did about the books and my time to help you. But, the desire to learn and grow is only part of the story. There must be a desire to learn and grow through the proper path of being disciplined. Self-discipline is a part of the Fruit of the SPirit (see Gal. 5:22-23). If you are not disciplined enough to follow through and read what you have agreed to read then your desire for knowledge has met a block in your character and until you find within you a determination by the Spirit of grace to overcome that you will be stuck.
And yes, our Seminary is unashamed of certain doctrinal convictions. Though not per se a Calvinist school that requires you to believe the entire Covenant Calvinist scheme, there are certain elements to which Calvin, as all who are born again and Evangelical, would affirm and in some limited places one would have to sign a doctrinal agreement position. We are a school that believes in discipleship, not a school that believes in each student making their own theology up as they go. There are plenty of schools that will gladly take your money though and let you do just that. So if you want a school that will let you bifurcate the process of discipleship without any doctrinal standards then they are not hard to find as the world is full of them. But ours is certainly not one of those and at least in our view of things, we are thankful it is not as we cherish the fundamentals of the faith as essential to one's soul and eternal life. As Paul said to his disciple Timothy, "Keep a close watch on yourself and on the teaching. Persist in this, for by doing so you will save both yourself and your hearers" (1 Tim. 4:16). Right teaching is a means for the salvation of people and thus we do not and will never embrace the skewed and humanistic idea that whatever one believes is ok and just as good as what anyone else believes. We hammer out truth by careful, precise, and thorough study and when we arrive at solid conclusions which are essential and of utmost importance, especially in regard to things like salvation, we mince no words, give no room for difference if right-minded, and smile with the grace of God glowing and burning upon and in us as we teach it to others hoping that they too will embrace it lest they one day awake in eternal hell without Christ's grace!
Dr. Allen
