Friday 11 March 2016

The Abomination of Desolation: A response to Walid Shoebat 9

Let's continue the response. I left the comments on the church fathers and the two senses for another time if the Lord Wills. I am holding it off for now. But I will look at the rest of his points that come after that section.

"In Bethlehem, dare you ask for a lady’s hand without using the matchmaker, go to the governor without a dignitary or buy a home without an agent. Only a fool negotiates his sentence, the marriage dowry or the price of his home. Such are thrown out of the Kingdom even including the one who does not come dressed properly to the wedding:
But when the king came in to see the guests, he noticed a man there who was not wearing wedding clothes. He asked, ‘How did you get in here without wedding clothes, friend?’ The man was speechless. “Then the king told the attendants, ‘Tie him hand and foot, and throw him outside, into the darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.’ (Matthew 22:11-13)
In this, Christ addresses the modern trickster who tells the congregants “come as you are”. Christ speaks prophetically on the condition of the falling away that we so clearly see, coming unprepared to the wedding. The lazy servant is one who comes to God’s wedding, improperly dressed, while for the politician, they dress as if they are entering Christ’s banquet."

Who said anything about coming as you are? This is an irrelevant point to your comments on the Abomination of Desolation, Oh that's right, your condemning all who don't follow your interpretation of end times amongst other things. Protestants (If they actually read their Bible) do NOT say, come as you are and live in sin, only anti-nomians say this. There are many I could list who repudiate sin, but I digress.

"I heard the empty arguments: “Rome insists that the Mass is the very same sacrifice as that of Calvary” (James White) “The whole concept of re-enacting and re-presenting Christ’s sacrifice on the cross is contrary to the clear teaching of Hebrews that this sacrifice occurred once for all time (Heb. 10:12-14)” (Norman Geisler)
But these are only assumptions. No Christian believes in re-sacrificing Christ. The Eucharist is a re-sacrifice if you will, but the same ‘once and for all’ sacrifice being madepresent to us now.
The argument can easily be countered in a Jesus-style question: John wrote his Gospel between 90-100 A.D., while early church documents at the time make it crystal clear, the Eucharist was being celebrated as the literal Flesh and Blood of Christ across the entire Roman Empire, so why didn’t John have made an explanation to clarify as he always did (see John 1:42; John 21:19) since the entire church was in error telling all Christians that the Eucharist was a re-sacrifice?
And if one insists on using scripture, the other Jesus-style question would be this: why is it that in each Gospel the mention of Satan entering Judas is in the context of the Last Supper that Jesus had this discourse on “eating his flesh” and is when Judas rejected the notion of Christ being the Eucharist? 
God allowed controversies, even Christ spoke in parables, in order to separate sheep from goats.
The goats will never get it."

White's point still stands I'm afraid, The Lord's Supper was a memorial for what Christ had done, Plus, John 6 already explains what Jesus is saying and what Jesus says in context refutes Shoebat's interpretation of John 6 as well as the other Roman Catholic apologists who abuse this text. Also, Satan entering Judas and Judas leaving has nothing to do with the rejection of transubstantiation. Why should John have to clarify to his audience what Jesus is saying, plus again, the church fathers did not hold to the modern Roman doctrine of transubstantiation. 

See the articles on John 6:

"Purgatory is taking a shower before you could jump in the pool (heaven) and it is in Maccabees. One needs to knock, seek and find, even ask, why seven books that Jesus used were removed from holy scriptures?
I don’t have a problem with taking showers. That shower, indeed is not for pigs, it is not even designed for humans who behave like pigs either. It is designed to remove whatever crud is left for Christians after living so long in a pig farm we call the world. I am not sure why so much fuss. Even the shower stall they go after to the point I am beginning to believe that such behavior is more fitting for Muslims rather than Christians. What else is left, the confession booth, the altar, the priest … until like locusts the swarm consumes everything and what is left is a bare naked Jesus huddled in the corner of every church.
Even that Jesus, these will insist to remove, barking daily that Jesus cannot be expressed in a statue, but only in a paper-thin photo as thin as their spirit that cannot fathom a trinitarian theology with trinitarian interpretation where Scriptures has so many facets that we could spend a lifetime never being able to fathom."

Won't be dwelling on Purgatory too much, though I will direct all to Keith Thompson's documentary refuting Purgatory: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6vnqFFUz_AU

For that matter, bowing a statue in a religious context is an act of Idolatry. Protestants have been telling Rome this for years, but Rome of course in their mind knows best and ignore the exhortation. You tell people to bow before a graven image, which is what many Catholics do, That is called an act of Idolatry and you know it. 

Furthermore, we don't know what Jesus looked like, so a statue is not even an accurate representation of him.

"Even His crucifix, instead of being like Simon of Cyrene, we should be honored to carry the Cross around our necks as the Copts do in Egypt, instead, we would be like the Roman torturer, going after Jesus, flogging Him by tormenting and taunting the saints who like taking daily showers, confessing directly to a priest, to the living saints on earth as they are also in heaven…"

A cross worn around our necks is not the same as purgatory, confession to a priest and calling on the saints in heaven.

See my articles on the saints below:

Seriously, It amazes me you are using your eschatology to conclude the Roman Church is true. 

"Every day I approve comments and see and I am beginning to be convinced 100% that so many are a miserable bunch who go after any sin. Even the infiltrators in the Catholic Church are blamed on every Catholic, Copt, Serbian, Greek, Russian Orthodox … so many are simply the accusers. These roam round about like devils using whatever few verses they remember to thwart the volumes of history and other books of the Bible they so much hate calling these “Apocrypha”. They prefer to feed from smelly cheese crumbs spilled by a glutton named Martin Luther who was an anti-Semite-devil in disguise.
Even exposing this devil, instead, they would rather attack Catholics, never-mind that this devil wrote a treatises titled The Jews and Their Lies. This one, just like these scoffers, taunted the people, begging them to go after poor Jews and requesting they burn their farms and annihilate the people in a holocaust while Pope Pius XII rescued more Jews than any man in history while gaining the title from scoffers as “Hitler’s Pope”.
Slander is key to recognizing the saint. Isn’t that what Jesus taught?"

This is nothing more than a tu quoque fallacy, Martin Luther (Not to excuse his actions against the Jews at all) didn't claim to be part of an infallible church. Rome however claims that when the Pope is speaking ex cathedra statements, he is making an infallible decoration. It doesn't surprise me that Shoebat went after Luther, after all, Theodore did the same thing in his debate with Keith Thompson. Like Father, Like Son.

I would need to look more into what Martin Luther actually did to Jews, but I will challenge Shoebat on this, Can you give me a source or quotation that backs up what your saying, or in the very least, link to something that backs up your claims. For that matter, Rome can be refuted not by just "using whatever few verses", the Bible itself, taking it as a historical document and not just a theological one, shows that the early church did NOT resemble the modern papal system.

Jesus said you will know them by the fruits and Rome demonstrates how much of a vile tree it is.

"Such holocaust was finally fulfilled from Luther’s instruction to be carried out by Hitler himself. And what is left of Germany today after stripping all the icons, seven books of the Bible, altars and confessional booths? Nothing but the flood of Muslim hordes issued forth from the mouth of the beast after the woman, a bloody river with multitudes from nations, tribes and different tongues raping and molesting as it was in the days of the Maccabees. Soon, Hagia Sophia will be desecrated, the Vatican and the “synagogues of God” where this horde will put their ensigns and hammer and chisel the stones of the Temple of God (Psalm 74). Soon we all will pray:
O God, why have You rejected us forever?
Why does Your anger smoke against the sheep of Your pasture?
Remember Your congregation, which You have purchased of old,
Which You have redeemed to be the tribe of Your inheritance;
And this Mount Zion, where You have dwelt.
Turn Your footsteps toward the perpetual ruins;
The enemy has damaged everything within the sanctuary.
Your adversaries have roared in the midst of Your meeting place;
They have set up their own standards for signs.
It seems as if one had lifted up
His axe in a forest of trees.
And now all its carved work
They smash with hatchet and hammers.
They have burned Your sanctuary to the ground;
They have defiled the dwelling place of Your name.
They said in their heart, “Let us completely subdue them.”
They have burned all the meeting places of God in the land.
We do not see our signs;
There is no longer any prophet,
Nor is there any among us who knows how long.
How long, O God, will the adversary revile,
And the enemy spurn Your name forever?
Why do You withdraw Your hand, even Your right hand?
From within Your bosom, destroy them!
Yet God is my king from of old,
Who works deeds of deliverance in the midst of the earth.
You divided the sea by Your strength;
You broke the heads of the sea monsters in the waters.
You crushed the heads of Leviathan;
You gave him as food for the creatures of the wilderness.
You broke open springs and torrents;
You dried up ever-flowing streams.
Yours is the day, Yours also is the night;
You have prepared the light and the sun.
You have established all the boundaries of the earth;
You have made summer and winter.
Remember this, O Lord, that the enemy has reviled,
And a foolish people has spurned Your name.
Do not deliver the soul of Your turtledove to the wild beast;
Do not forget the life of Your afflicted forever.
Consider the covenant;
For the dark places of the land are full of the habitations of violence.
Let not the oppressed return dishonored;
Let the afflicted and needy praise Your name.
Arise, O God, and plead Your own cause;
Remember how the foolish man reproaches You all day long.
Do not forget the voice of Your adversaries,
The uproar of those who rise against You which ascends continually. (Psalm 74)
To the trickster and the scoffer I ask: where are your “carved work”? “And now all its carved work
They smash with hatchet and hammers..” Can you interpret through the spirit and see the many meanings of all this?
Trickster, the clown and the gymnast, the devil will not only pass to you what he himself does not believe is true, but he will pass through you whatever falsity that youbelieve through him. You say: “and what use do we have for church fathers when we have Scriptures”? But I say to you: “Why do we deal treacherously each against his brother so as to profane the covenant of our fathers?” (Malachi 2:10) and did He not also say “He will restore the hearts of the fathers to their children and the hearts of the children to their fathers, so that I will not come and smite the land with a curse”?
Has God created a church, or a void that was empty for entire twenty centuries until a trickster named Zwingli showed up fifteen centuries later?
No. I will shun away the trickster and the politician. I will cause an earthquake, shatter myths and take the Grain Offering."

Protestants (Biblical ones) stripping away Catholic idols and evil papal practices did not cause the Muslims to come in and take Germany over. What you have in Europe are liberals and people falling away and letting paganism and atheism come into the culture. THAT is why the Muslims are being let into a country and are taking over. Plus Malachi 2:10 and that section in chapter 4 about striking the land with a curse have NOTHING to do with the church or the church fathers. The passages in question are talking about Israel:

"Malachi 2:10 Do we not all have one Father[b]? Did not one God create us? Why do we profane the covenant of our ancestors by being unfaithful to one another?

11 Judah has been unfaithful. A detestable thing has been committed in Israel and in Jerusalem: Judah has desecrated the sanctuary the Lord loves by marrying women who worship a foreign god. 12 As for the man who does this, whoever he may be, may the Lord remove him from the tents of Jacob[c]—even though he brings an offering to the Lord Almighty.

13 Another thing you do: You flood the Lord’s altar with tears. You weep and wail because he no longer looks with favor on your offerings or accepts them with pleasure from your hands. 14 You ask, “Why?” It is because the Lord is the witness between you and the wife of your youth. You have been unfaithful to her, though she is your partner, the wife of your marriage covenant.

15 Has not the one God made you? You belong to him in body and spirit. And what does the one God seek? Godly offspring.[d] So be on your guard, and do not be unfaithful to the wife of your youth.

16 “The man who hates and divorces his wife,” says the Lord, the God of Israel, “does violence to the one he should protect,”[e] says the Lord Almighty.

So be on your guard, and do not be unfaithful."

The people of Israel in Malachi were sinning greatly against YHWH and such can be found in the context. In particular in chapter 2, the people of Judah were guilty of intermarrying with Gentiles, something that the Torah forbad the Israelites from doing. The fathers that are mentioned in verse 10 are the ancestors of the Israelite people.

God has always preserved a remnant throughout history, even before the Protestant Reformation took place. You don't have to be a Roman Catholic to be a Christian, in fact it would make you the opposite.

Also, Malachi 4, let's read it:
"4 [a]“Surely the day is coming; it will burn like a furnace. All the arrogant and every evildoer will be stubble, and the day that is coming will set them on fire,” says the Lord Almighty. “Not a root or a branch will be left to them. 2 But for you who revere my name, the sun of righteousness will rise with healing in its rays. And you will go out and frolic like well-fed calves. 3 Then you will trample on the wicked; they will be ashes under the soles of your feet on the day when I act,” says the Lord Almighty.

4 “Remember the law of my servant Moses, the decrees and laws I gave him at Horeb for all Israel.

5 “See, I will send the prophet Elijah to you before that great and dreadful day of the Lord comes. 6 He will turn the hearts of the parents to their children, and the hearts of the children to their parents; or else I will come and strike the land with total destruction.”"

This is warning to the Jews not to fall away from the Torah, but to keep it and to wait for the coming Elijah. 

Finally, It is abundantly clear in his material that Walid Shoebat does not understand what Sola Scriptura teaches. Sola Scriptura is the sole infallible rule of faith of the church, It does NOT mean that the church fathers are useless. It does not mean that you cannot appeal to history. The church fathers can be of great benefit to people. There are certainly a lot very enlightening things that can be found in their writings and certainly can be very helpful. HOWEVER..... They do not replace the scripture or become infallible authorities. You, Me and other apologists are to be judged by scripture, for that is the infallible rule of faith and the ULTIMATE rule of faith, NOT the only rule, but the ULTIMATE rule.

See my articles on Sola Scriptura:

Answering Judaism

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