I AM GOING STRAIGHT TO HEAVEN

"I Know that I am Going Straight to Heaven when I die!"

So I was told by a non-Catholic recently. He would not tell me which denomination he belonged to but did say that he was an elder. He immediately started with his litany of criticism of the Catholic Church and said that he liked Martin Luther. When I realized that this was headed towards being a one sided conversation on his part, I replied that I would be happy to answer any question that he may have if he would first answer only one very simple question of mine.

"Please name the person who founded the Catholic Church?" He ignored it and continued with his litany. So I turned my simple question around with: "Please name the Church that Jesus Christ founded?" Again he refused to answer my simple question and continued with his agenda, so I ended the one sided conversation promptly.

You see we all must obey Holy Scripture: Titus 3:10-11, "As for a man who is factious, after admonishing him once or twice, have nothing more to do with him, knowing that such a person is perverted and sinful; he is self-condemned."

I believe he knew very well the answer to my question but was likely one of those who taught that the Catholic Church fell into apostasy as many denominations teach. Also by telling me the truth he would be admitting that Jesus Christ was the founder of the Catholic Church.

If he did admit that then I could see him as being a new Saul who persecuted Acts 9:3-5, "Now as he journeyed he approached Damascus, and suddenly a light from heaven flashed about him. And he fell to the ground and heard a voice saying to him, "Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?"" And he said, "Who are you, Lord?" And he said, "I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting."

Why did Jesus say "why do you persecute me" instead of saying 'why do you persecute My Church'? It is because His Church is His Body, Ephesians 1:22-23, Colossians 1:18,24.

Now let us go back to his remark, the title of this page... His remark of "I know that I am going straight to heaven when I die", is in reality the deadly 'sin of presumption', and I will explain. He is guilty of a false Protestant teaching, that is to grab one Bible verse that sounds goo exegesis, that is of context, context, and context.

Case in point: The entire Bible is harmonious. There are no errors within it, only 'apparent' errors as seen by those who seek the truth but not by those who have a contrary agenda. Here is the verse that they use mostly to try to justify their false belief in their 'guaranteed' salvation: Romans 10:9, "For if thou confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in thy heart that God hath raised him up from the dead, thou shalt be saved."

Now if they would only read the very next verse there is a stumbling block therein that is ignored: Romans 10:10, "For, with the heart, we believe unto justice: but, with the mouth, confession is made unto salvation."

Now let us see what one of the best Bible commentaries has to say about Romans 10:9, Haydock's 1859 edition:"Ver. 9. Thou shalt be saved. To confess the Lord Jesus, and to call upon the name of the Lord, (ver. 13.) is not barely the professing of a belief in the person of Christ: but moreover implies a belief of his whole doctrine, and an obedience to his law; without which the calling of him Lord will save no man.

(St. Matthew vii. 21.) (Challoner) --- This passage must be understood like many others of this apostle, of a faith accompanied by a good-will ready to perform what faith says must be practised; as it is required in this very place, that what we believe in the heart, we should confess with our mouth. (Estius)"

Now since we all know that the Bible is harmonous from beginning to end, did you notice that Haydock's steered us to another verse that has more to say regarding Romans 10:9? Matthew 7:21, "Not every one who says to me, 'Lord, Lord,' shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven."

Is that verse a contradiction of Romans 10:9? Not at all. It is merely adding to its c context. Not every verse can contain every condition associated with it for obvious reasons. For one, the fact that other Biblical authors had written regarding the same subject, but from a different point of view and their differences are an addition to the context of the whole subject.

Here are many more verses regarding the 'sin of presumption'.

James 4:13-16, "Come now, you who say, "Today or tomorrow we will go into such and such a town and spend a year there and trade and get gain"; whereas you do not know about tomorrow. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes. Instead you ought to say, "If the Lord wills, we shall live and we shall do this or that." As it is, you boast in your arrogance. All such boasting is evil."

Isaiah 13:11, "I will punish the world for its evil, and the wicked for their iniquity; I will put an end to the pride of the arrogant, and lay low the haughtiness of the ruthless."

Romans 12:3, "For by the grace given to me I bid every one among you not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but to think with sober judgment, each according to the measure of faith which God has assigned him."

2Timothy 4:3-4, "For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own likings, and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander into myths."

Luke 9:23, "And he said to all, "If any man would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me"."

James 4:10, "Humble yourselves before the Lord and he will exalt you."

1Peter 5:5, "Likewise you that are younger be subject to the elders. Clothe yourselves, all of you, with humility toward one another, for "God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble."

Numbers 15:30, "But the soul that doeth ought presumptuously, whether he be born in the land, or a stranger, the same reproacheth the LORD; and that soul shall be cut off from among his people."

James 4:6, "But he gives more grace; therefore it says, "God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble"."

Deuteronomy 18:20, "But the prophet who presumes to speak a word in my name which I have not commanded him to speak, or who speaks in the name of other gods, that same prophet shall die."

Philippians 2:12, "Therefore, my beloved, as you have always obeyed, so now, not only as in my presence but much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling;"

Luke 14:10-11, "But when you are invited, go and sit in the lowest place, so that when your host comes he may say to you, 'Friend, go up higher'; then you will be honored in the presence of all who sit at table with you. For every one who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted."

1Corinthians 10:11-12, "Now these things happened to them as a warning, but they were written down for our instruction, upon whom the end of the ages has come. Therefore let any one who thinks that he stands take heed lest he fall."

Rom 2:4-6, Or do you presume upon the riches of his kindness and forbearance and patience? Do you not know that God's kindness is meant to lead you to repentance? But by your hard and impenitent heart you are storing up wrath for yourself on the day of wrath when God's righteous judgment will be revealed. For he will render to every man according to his works."

"Hebrews 10:26-27, "For if we sin deliberately after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins, but a fearful prospect of judgment, and a fury of fire which will consume the adversaries."

Deuteronomy 6:16, "You shall not put the LORD your God to the test, as you tested him at Massah."

1Corinthians 10:9, "We must not put the Lord to the test, as some of them did and were destroyed by serpents;"

2Corinthians 10:18, "For it is not the man who commends himself that is accepted, but the man whom the Lord commends."

Oh yes, remember at the beginning of this message that elder who contacted me and would not answer a single question of mine? He said he liked Martin Luther. Well it is too bad that he either did not read the writings by Luther, or did and ignored much of what Luther wrote. Here is a gem that Luther wrote, complete with references:

Letter to Melanchthon, August 1, 1521 Luther's Works, vol. 48

"If you are a preacher of grace, then preach a true and not a fictitious grace; if grace is true, you must bear a true and not a fictitious sin. God does not save people who are only fictitious sinners. Be a sinner and sin boldly, but believe and rejoice in Christ even more boldly.... as long as we are here [in this world] we have to sin.... No sin will separate us from the Lamb, even though we commit fornication and murder a thousand times a day."

Written by Bob Stanley

December 7, 2015

THE FIRST PROTESTANT!

The Legacy left by Martin Luther, the first Protestant!

His The Legacy is Not something that anyone should be proud of.

"Obey your superiors and be subject to them, for they keep watch as having to render an account of your souls; so that they may do this with joy, and not with grief, for that would not be expedient for you." (Hebrews 13:17)

Martin Luther, the originator of the false man-made doctrine of Sola Scriptura and its accompanying individual interpretation of Holy Scripture, obviously avoided that verse, and many others as well. Sola Scriptura, or Bible only, means, "if it is not in the Bible, I will not believe it".

I have just shown that, even if it is in the Bible, some will not believe it if they choose not to.

I will show many more verses as examples of Scripture ignored by non-Catholics in this text.

Martin Luther was definitely disobedient to his superiors, the authority of the Catholic Church, of which he was a member. Show me from where Luther's self proclaimed authority came?

He was an Augustinian monk, and was not a Bishop. He had no authority at all. He blatantly ignored more verses from Scripture which plainly tell us wherein the final authority lies, and it did not lie with himself, but with his opposition, the Catholic Church.

"If your brother sins against you, go and tell him his fault, between you and him alone. If he listens to you, you have gained your brother. But if he does not listen, take one or two others along with you, that every word may be confirmed by the evidence of two or three witnesses. If he refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church; and if he refuses to listen even to the church, let him be to you as a Gentile and a tax collector." (Matthew 18:15-17),

Clearly, this is GOD given authority to His Church, from words spoken by Jesus Christ Himself.

These verses were clearly ignored by Martin Luther.

He also ignored the lessons taught to us in the Old Testament:

"Miriam and Aaron spoke against Moses because of the Cushite woman whom he had married, for he had married a Cushite woman; and they said, “Has the Lord indeed spoken only through Moses? Has he not spoken through us also?” And the Lord heard it. Now the man Moses was very meek, more than all men that were on the face of the earth. And suddenly the Lord said to Moses and to Aaron and Miriam, “Come out, you three, to the tent of meeting.” And the three of them came out. And the Lord came down in a pillar of cloud, and stood at the door of the tent, and called Aaron and Miriam; and they both came forward. And he said, “Hear my words: If there is a prophet among you, I the Lord make myself known to him in a vision, I speak with him in a dream. Not so with my servant Moses; he is entrusted with all my house. With him I speak mouth to mouth, clearly, and not in dark speech; and he beholds the form of the Lord. Why then were you not afraid to speak against my servant Moses?” And the anger of the Lord was kindled against them, and he departed;..."(Numbers 12:1-9)

Here is another set of verses on the same theme, these again ignored by Luther:

It is rather lengthy for this post, but please read of the rebellion of Korah and his followers against the authority of Moses. Pay particular attention to the ending of those who refused to submit to the authority of GOD's Father Figure on earth. It isn't pretty. (Numbers 16:1-35)

Those who deliberately ignore the errors of those who have gone before us in recorded history are doomed to repeat them again.

Dispensation of authority by GOD over His flock is the same today as it was then. GOD is the same yesterday, today, and forever. Apparently Luther did not know this or he ignored the fact.

He had no GOD given authority whatsoever, so he claimed he was his own authority so to speak. Luther had written many pamphlets and had them printed and distributed all over Europe.

In his pamphlet titled "The Papacy at Rome", of 1520, he claimed his own authority by 'twisting' Holy Scripture in a futile attempt to justify himself. Here are some excerpts from that pamphlet:

"It is to this church, to the believers, that Jesus gave the keys."

Sorry Luther, but you were wrong:
The only place where Jesus gave the keys to anyone is in Matthew 16:19 and He gave them to Peter and to him alone. The Greek word used in this verse for 'you' is singular, second person.

"The keys belong to the whole church and to each of its members."

Sorry Luther, but you were wrong again:
See the note regarding the previous remark made by Luther. The keys are the singular teaching authority of the Church, and if everyone had a set as Luther had claimed here, then each and every person automatically became his or her own pope. Isn't that exactly what happened in Protestantism with each person interpreting Scripture for himself?

By making this statement, each and every member of his movement thought they had a set of keys and thus became his or her own infallible discerner of Holy Scripture. "What feels good for me must be the truth", is what his statement means. A central authority or "Supreme Court", a final discernment of Holy Scripture in Protestantism was non-existent from the very beginning. This is a clear violation of yet more verses of Scripture.

"First of all you must understand this, that no prophecy of scripture is a matter of one's own interpretation, because no prophecy ever came by the impulse of man, but men moved by the Holy Spirit spoke from God." (2Peter 1:20-21)

See? Luther was really saying to the world that he and his followers will reject the teaching of GOD and accept instead the teaching of man, namely his. Now that places him in violation of yet more verses,
But Peter and the apostles answered, "We must obey God rather than men". (Acts 5:29)
"If we receive the testimony of men, the testimony of GOD is greater...". (1John 5:9)

The pamphlet, "The Papacy at Rome", was written early in the game, 1520, and it is obvious that Luther was trying to convey to his followers that he had some sort of authority in order to justify his movement to separate from the Catholic Church. However, he obviously failed to do so, and thus quickly moved on to the next and much more destructive stages.

Even at the time it all began in 1520, the Catholic Church was the longest lived institution on earth, having been in existence for almost 1500 years. The Church rested upon a sturdy three legged support with one leg being Holy Scripture, a second holy Apostolic tradition, and the third the Pope and Magisterium, the teaching authority.

By his own actions in his separation from the one legitimate Church founded by Jesus Christ, Luther lost the one leg of authority, as he could not claim the Papacy and the Magisterium for himself. Secondly, since he formed his own church, he could not claim Catholic Apostolic tradition. Since he could not claim Apostolic tradition either, he lumped it in with man made tradition and thereby condemned all tradition. In doing so he violated still another verse of Holy Scripture,
"So then, brethren, stand firm and hold to the traditions which you were taught by us, either by word of mouth or by letter." (2Thessalonians 2:15)

Once again, the teaching of GOD in Holy Scripture is superseded by the teaching of man.