Where did Adam go?

It has now been over 48 hours since Adam last posted a comment.
I guess I'm wondering where he went.

Obviously it is too soon to say anything about the final outcome of our little debate, but I hope he hasn't flown the coop.

Adam, where are you?

Deeper into Gnosticism and relativistic morality

Clean cars run better. So do clean minds.

-1 Cor 15:50-52 is an interesting passage that I've discussed often with Preterists and Futurists alike. I'm not certain that the passage talks about our physical bodies changing.

I've already cited numerous psgs to the effect that we come in bodies resembling Christ's. His resurrected body was physical and glorified. He was tangible, He ate fish, He walked, He started a fire and put fish to roast over it, He invited people to touch Him (and they did), etc.
Just like 1 John 1:1 says - "1That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we looked upon and have TOUCHED WITH OUR HANDS, concerning the word of life"

-Colossians 2:12 talks of those who were raised with Christ into new life -- but they had not changed, had they? What changed? Their spiritual lives, for sure.

Yes, but that is where our positions are parallel.

-Go to verse 15 and you see that the Book talks of "spiritual rulers and authorities" not physical kings. Interesting that they speak of Spiritual rulers who truly did not rule the Spiritual realm.

Yes, but the thought is not continuous. Who cares?

-no new bodies in this new life.

Right, b/c they come later.

-The word used by Peter when he "saw" him was actually "He appeared to me"

It doesn't matter, for the reasons cited above.

-Even Peter explained that your body must die before it becomes a new body -- the seed dies before the plant comes to grow.

Yes, a new *body*.

-Luke 17:20: One day the Pharisees asked Jesus, "When will the Kingdom of God come?" Jesus replied, "The Kingdom of God can't be detected by visible signs

B/c Jesus was preaching to them that the Kingdom had ALREADY come upon them. And this was 30 AD! In what sense? That the "finger of God" was among them, that the Messiah had come.
And geez, you didn't even cite the next verse, which also wrecks your position.

20Being asked by the Pharisees when the kingdom of God would come, he answered them, "The kingdom of God is not coming with signs to be observed, 21nor will they say, 'Look, here it is!' or 'There!' for behold, the kingdom of God is in the midst of you."

In numerous places the Pharisees demanded signs from Him and He chastised them for being sinful and refusing the signs He had already shared. That's the way we must take this. But we know from Matt 24 that the sign of the Son will appear, so it's a different kind of coming.

-Luke 17:22 - "The time is coming when you will long to see the day when the Son of Man returns, but you won't see it.

Exactly, b/c He won't return before they have died. I can't believe that
1) you could only cite 2 verses w/in 2 verses of each other to support your position
2) you left out the one in the middle that wrecks your position
3) the 2nd one ALSO wrecks your position.

-But the 1000 years means nothing here, Peter was just explaining God's patience, not actually saying that 1 day = 1000 years.

To God it is. To us, it may seem a long time.

-As for 40 years, that is one generation (Biblically relevant).

You turn the Millennium of Revelation into 40 yrs. I would like to know how you justify it.

-Christ said He would Return in that very generation (40 years).

Where?

-Christ returned so long ago and most ignored it because it reduced their power to scare others into paying them to speak to them about scary, scary things.

That's a mighty big accusation to throw at a LOT of people. I wonder if you can back it up.

-Over and over Jesus said "at hand" and "quickly" and "soon."

But you forget the other places where Jesus said things that disagree w/ you. You have selective vision.

-Ezekiel 12's warning was not about the New Covenant and Jesus, it was about God's judgment against those Jews which happened immediately after Ezekiel prophecized it.

You may have a point. But you must interact, then, w/
Ezek 36

22"Therefore say to the house of Israel, Thus says the Lord GOD: It is not for your sake, O house of Israel, that I am about to act, but for the sake of my holy name, which you have profaned among the nations to which you came. 23And I will vindicate the holiness of my great name, which has been profaned among the nations, and which you have profaned among them. And the nations will know that I am the LORD, declares the Lord GOD, when through you I vindicate my holiness before their eyes. 24I will take you from the nations and gather you from all the countries and bring you into your own land. 25I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you shall be clean from all your uncleannesses, and from all your idols I will cleanse you. 26And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. 27And I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my rules. 28You shall dwell in the land that I gave to your fathers, and you shall be my people, and I will be your God.

-(In Revelation) What specifically would you say has not happened?

I've listed quite a few things you've not responded to yet. I'll not retype them.

-But Christ wasn't talking about Heaven, He was talking about the Kingdom on the earth, which even existed when the Pharisees talked to Him. He told them it existed in their very day but they didn't see it.

Agreed, that's part of the Kingdom (since Messiah came) but you're not dealing w/ Revelation 21-22 still.
The Curse brings death, which brings decay. The Curse is gone in the Eternal Kingdom of Rev 21-22. Things decay NOW. We are not, therefore, in the Eternal Kingdom.
Seriously, you need to start dealing w/ Rev 21-22 soon.

-(RE Is 65:17)The phrase "old Heaven and Earth" meant one thing to the Jews -- their Temple.

Is 65:17-25

17"For behold, I create new heavens and a new earth, and the former things shall not be remembered or come into mind.
18But be glad and rejoice forever in that which I create; for behold, I create Jerusalem to be a joy, and her people to be a gladness.
19I will rejoice in Jerusalem and be glad in my people; no more shall be heard in it the sound of weeping and the cry of distress.
20No more shall there be in it an infant who lives but a few days, or an old man who does not fill out his days, for the young man shall die a hundred years old, and the sinner a hundred years old shall be accursed.
21They shall build houses and inhabit them; they shall plant vineyards and eat their fruit.
22They shall not build and another inhabit; they shall not plant and another eat; for like the days of a tree shall the days of my people be, and my chosen shall long enjoy the work of their hands.
23They shall not labor in vain or bear children for calamity, for they shall be the offspring of the blessed of the LORD, and their descendants with them.
24Before they call I will answer; while they are yet speaking I will hear.
25The wolf and the lamb shall graze together; the lion shall eat straw like the ox, and dust shall be the serpent's food. They shall not hurt or destroy in all my holy mountain," says the LORD.

I don't see the Temple there. To be 100% sure, modern Jerusalem or Jerusalem in dang near ANY period of history isn't described here.
I see eternity and alot of things that are not present in the earth TODAY.
Your theology doesn't match the Word of God. Repent of your theology.

-Christ was speaking of destroying "the old Heaven and Earth," which was the Temple (which happened!)

John 2:18-22

18So the Jews said to him, "What sign do you show us for doing these things?" 19Jesus answered them, "Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up." 20The Jews then said, "It has taken forty-six years to build this temple, and will you raise it up in three days?" 21But he was speaking about the temple of his body. 22When therefore he was raised from the dead, his disciples remembered that he had said this, and they believed the Scripture and the word that Jesus had spoken.

In a *separate* instance He spoke of destroying the temple in Jerusalem. But the parallel to the body of Christ is w/ His body, not the temple.

-Can you see the Church today? No, because it exists within YOU.

Show me ANY psg of Scr to support that. The ecclesia is always in the NT a GROUP of people gathered to do quite a few things, which I've already told you. Make arguments, not bare assertions.

-It is not a physical building like the Temple was, it is spiritual and seen through good deeds.

It is physical AND spiritual, and it is the gathering of the believers in Jesus.
Where do you get this idea of "seen through good deeds"? What does that mean?

-the Earth will never perish (there's a Bible verse about that, actually).

Show me - I've already cited several which clearly state the earth's days are numbered.

-The Heavenly Kingdom we don't really know what to make of, but we do know it will be glorious beyond belief.

We know all about it from Revelation.
I also know that you won't be there, b/c liars don't go there. And you deny that Jesus has come in the flesh (1 Jn 4) - you are a liar.

-Tithes and offerings? When did Jesus tell people to sell everything and bring Him their proceeds?

Matthew 19:16-23

-Christ wanted us to go out into our daily lives, not to force people to come to us.

Assertion w/o an argument.

...

-We weren't meant to govern over each other, though.

Romans 13 disagrees w/ you.
And you already explained your disagreement w/ me over that back at the Living Room. You sidestepped the issue when I asked you about WW2 and whether the Holocaust was sinful. You said:

ADAM: Come on, hypocrite, the Holocaust to a Futurist was blessed by God! Look, friend, offer your own thoughts to your support of Romans as bond — Romans 13:

No, I don't believe that and don't have to.
Romans 13 says that the gov't is instituted "for your good" and of its authority to punish wrongdoers. That's dealing w/ the context, sthg which you are unable to do b/c it would destroy your idolatrous theology. So...an evil gov't like the Nazis, I would be obligated to "obey God rather than men" and oppose it b/c it's MURDERING PEOPLE.

The only way you can get around the gov't's institution by God is to claim (absent any support from anywhere near the psg in Romans) that all this stuff means nothing now that the "Kingdom has come". You're a long way off from coherence.

-we definitely don't have to worry about Judgment.

The battle cry of millions of rebels against God for 2 millennia. "Where is the promise of His coming?"

-Through all actions we perform on others, we should think of love first

Why "should" we? Why not simply eat, drink, and be merry, since there is no sin and no judgment? You yourself said this:

ADAM: If I said that Jesus commanded us to do anything, I did it in error. I have never felt that Jesus offered anyone commands to do anything

-He knew where it would lead us -- to the Kingdom where all can serve and love.

Yes, and we're not there yet. It's clear to everyone except you.

Peace.

Timing is everything!

Adam has commented, and I thank him for his responses. He's lost a little fleetness of foot since the last time we talked, but hopefully he can get it back.

-Funny that Paul rebuked Hymenaeus for his timing, not for what he taught.

I doubt he called his TIMING "gangrene".

-It is interesting that Paul never corrected Hymenaeus on his teaching of HOW the New Kingdom would come.

3-4 sentences in the NT deal w/ him. Let's look elsewhere. You can start w/ all the psgs I've already cited.

-Any Christian then could look around and see that nothing really changed, but they didn't call him out on THAT -- just the timing. Paul also knew that the New Kingdom would come spiritually, not physically.

That's an interesting thing to say. Let me ask you sthg.

1 Cor 15:50-52 says we will all be changed. In 70 AD, what happened to the Corinthian church? How were they changed?

-Christ Himself said it would not be visible.

Where?

-As to 2 Peter 3, I think we can agree that the 1000 years/1 day comes from Psalm 90, correct?

Oh, perhaps.
You know, if you're going to get snarky about the interp of what 1000 yrs means, how do you justify transmogrifying it into less than 40 years?

-They're not saying that "at hand" or "quickly" means thousands of years, at all.

An assertion that fails to take the context into acct. The context is people like you, the scoffers, who say "Where is the promise of His coming?"
You know, in 2000 yrs they haven't stopped saying that.

-They're just showing God's patience

You don't believe in God's patience b/c you find it unconscionable that God could wait more than a few decades to accomplish His grand plan.

-quickly means quickly.

You mean like in Ezek 12:21-28?
I see "the days are near" in there, as well as "but in your days, O rebellious house...I will perform it" and particularly 27-28:

26And the word of the LORD came to me: 27"Son of man, behold, they of the house of Israel say, 'The vision that he sees is for many days from now, and he prophesies of times far off.' 28Therefore say to them, Thus says the Lord GOD: None of my words will be delayed any longer, but the word that I speak will be performed, declares the Lord GOD."

And yet the New Covenant, to which this refers, came about 400 years later!
Your insistence on timing being more important than WHAT THE THING IS is bunk. God is way bigger than you think He is.

-just as the unbelieving Jews of the 1st Century were,

I believe that God's judgment fell on them in 70 AD. But that's not The Judgment, it's not The Resurrection, it's not The Parousia. How do I know? Tons of things the Bible tells us will happen then didn't.

-Romans 5:18 says that Christ's Return was for everyone, by the way. It doesn't save for believers alone.

True, but His return will be judgment, fearful wrath for unbelievers.

-Romans 5, and I see no place where the curse of Adam would be lifted.

I was referring to the dichotomy between Adam = Death/Condemnation and Christ = life/justification.
The Curse of Genesis 3 does have, after all, "and to dust you shall return." That's where death came in.

-I'm not sure where you read that mortal things won't decay

Exactly - it's your ludicrous position that made me bring it up. Things decay NOW. In the eternal Kingdom, they won't. Ergo, this is not the eternal Kingdom.

-It is obvious from the mess that the temples of organized religion are in that very few indeed do understand that the Kingdom is now, and the Ecclesia of God is within all to grasp. So many mortal lives wasted in judgment of others instead of loving others and serving others.

Your theology is an absolute catastrophe.

-the nations would still exist. And they do.

Why is that a problem for my position?

-Revelation was NOT about destroying this mortal earth

Is 65:17
Rev 21:1 (Turi already brought this up - I am losing confidence in your reading comprehension and retention abilities)
2 Pet 3:10
It's hard to have a new earth w/o blowing up the 1st.

-We are given new spiritual and holy bodies, but our mortal bodies don't change.

This assertion did not deal w/ the psgs I cited to the contrary. You need to interact w/ those.

-but the imperishable spiritual ones can, and do!

But *CHRIST'S* body was not merely spiritual - check 1 John for that one.
Wow - a Hymenaean, a Gnostic, AND a Docetist. You're racking up the points, my friend.

-lying has nothing to do with Revelation.

P1: It says liars will not enter in.
P2: I say Christ is raised PHYSICALLY as will we all, in the eternal Kingdom.
P3: You say we're already in the eternal Kingdom.

S: Therefore, I'm a liar and did not enter in.

Crude syllogism, but it demonstrates the incoherence of your position.

-Repent from what?

Your sin.

-I don't lie. I don't trick others in believing me. I use the very Book to show people God's Love for everyone, even the non-believer (but especially the believer). I give away all of my extra earnings to those who believe.

And your prideful arrogance.

-I don't believe in 'churches' as even in the Book we don't see denominations or churches

You are blind - >80% of references to 'ecclesia' in the NT are to local bodies of believers.

-For those who ignore it, they are not condemned.

See my previous post on Hell.

-If you believe people are condemned, where do they go after mortal death?

Hell.

-If you believe salvation is for today, who is saved?

Those who are justified by God's grace through faith alone.

-Jesus said only the few would see the Kingdom in His timeframe, so how is it that 2.1 billion Christians would be "a few" (?)

You forgot the context - He's contrasting "the many" w/ "the few". Few will find life in comparison w/ the many who go to destruction.

-Stop going to your congregations

Heb 10:23-25
There's another thing to repent of - exhorting others to disobey God.

-He prepared such a glorious and perfect Kingdom for us, here and now

The sad thing is that you're settling for this earth, and you will settle - this is as close to Heaven as you're ever going to get, unless you repent.

Peace.

Hell is not in the Bible

Adam said:

And what exactly is your Biblical basis for "destruction" (?)...there is no Hell in the Bible

You know, you're not the only one in the world who has a problem w/ the doctrine of Hell. Mormons do, JWs do, atheists definitely do, liberals do.
But it's just not a possible position to hold if you care about the Bible.

Matt 7:13 - For the gate is wide and the way is easy that leads to destruction,
Matt 7:23 - And then will I declare to them, 'I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness.'
Matt 10:28 - Rather fear him who can destroy both soul and body in hell.
Matt 11:24 - But I tell you that it will be more tolerable on the day of judgment for the land of Sodom than for you."
Matt 12:37-41 - for by your words you will be justified, and by your words you will be condemned...The men of Nineveh will rise up at the judgment with this generation and condemn it, for they repented at the preaching of Jonah, and behold, something greater than Jonah is here.
Matt 23:33 - You serpents, you brood of vipers, how are you to escape being sentenced to hell?
Matt 25:41 & 46 - Then he will say to those on his left, 'Depart from me, you cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels...And these will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.
John 5:24 - He does not come into judgment, but has passed from death to life.
John 5:28-29 - Do not marvel at this, for an hour is coming when all who are in the tombs will hear his voice 29and come out, those who have done good to the resurrection of life, and those who have done evil to the resurrection of judgment.

You who claim to care so much about not making Jesus out to be a liar, you have no excuse not to believe in the eternal punishment of the reprobate.

Hear what the rest of the Scripture has to say:

Is 66:24 - "And they shall go out and look on the dead bodies of the men who have rebelled against me. For their worm shall not die, their fire shall not be quenched, and they shall be an abhorrence to all flesh."
Dan 12:2 - And many of those who sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt.
Rom 2:5 - But because of 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.
Rom 2:8 - but for those who are self-seeking and do not obey the truth, but obey unrighteousness, there will be wrath and fury.
Rom 2:12 - For all who have sinned without the law will also perish without the law, and all who have sinned under the law will be judged by the law.
Rom 5:18 - Therefore, as one trespass led to condemnation for all men,
Rom 6:23 - For the wages of sin is death
Rom 8:3 - By sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh
2 Thess 1:9 - They will suffer the punishment of eternal destruction, away from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his might
Jude 7 - just as Sodom and Gomorrah and the surrounding cities, which likewise indulged in sexual immorality and pursued unnatural desire, serve as an example by undergoing a punishment of eternal fire.
Jude 12-13 - 12These are blemishes on your love feasts...casting up the foam of their own shame; wandering stars, for whom the gloom of utter darkness has been reserved forever.
Rev 14:11 - And the smoke of their torment goes up forever and ever, and they have no rest, day or night, these worshipers of the beast and its image, and whoever receives the mark of its name."
Rev 20:15 - And if anyone's name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire.

There's more where that came from, but that's a good start.

Hymenaenism discussed

In the combox for my previous post, Adam has already been stirring up controversy w/ the erstwhile Italian scholar Turi, and Turi has rightly taken him to task:

I cannot imagine how anyone could honestly represent modern history as the New Earth... tell this Adam fellow when you get to talking with him that I at least am highly disappointed and should like my money back.

Indeed.
A cursory glance over Adam's comments on the LivingRoom blog will reveal that he holds to all sorts of wacked-out ideas. No offense is intended to him personally, but rather a warning - he is a blind man leading other blind men and is on his way to destruction.

One of my main thesis statements for responding to Adam's Hymenaean claims will be 2 Peter 3:

2that you should remember the predictions of the holy prophets and the commandment of the Lord and Savior through your apostles, 3knowing this first of all, that scoffers will come in the last days with scoffing, following their own sinful desires. 4They will say, "Where is the promise of his coming? For ever since the fathers fell asleep, all things are continuing as they were from the beginning of creation." 5For they deliberately overlook this fact, that the heavens existed long ago, and the earth was formed out of water and through water by the word of God, 6and that by means of these the world that then existed was deluged with water and perished. 7But by the same word the heavens and earth that now exist are stored up for fire, being kept until the day of judgment and destruction of the ungodly.

8But do not overlook this one fact, beloved, that with the Lord one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day. 9The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance. 10But the day of the Lord will come like a thief, and then the heavens will pass away with a roar, and the heavenly bodies will be burned up and dissolved, and the earth and the works that are done on it will be exposed.

(boldface mine, of course)

Hymenaeanism is an ancient heresy, one of the oldest. It stems from Paul's twice mentioning having to rebuke Hymenaeus for teaching that the resurrection had already occurred. Adam does the same, and from this erroneous position flows a stream of twisted, damnable, and indeed damnING doctrine; that sin is gone, that Christ has already come, that the Old Testament is garbage, that there is no heaven or hell, that all will be "saved", that "saved" is totally different from the NT presentation of it, that the resurrection is not of the body.

He is one of the scoffers mentioned in the 2 Peter passage. He says things like

In my Bible, it shows Christ reminding those early Christians that He would be coming back to vanquish sin, while some of them would still be alive, in the current generation. It doesn’t say that He might take 2000 years to return. Are you calling Christ a liar, or is my Bible wrong when it says He was returning in that generation, while some of the first Christians were still alive, to vanquish sin once and for all, reuniting all to God’s favor?

Loose translation: Where is the promise of His coming?

Adam believes that the judgment has already occurred and that Christ has already come back.
Turi already touched on one of the arguments I would like to cite against his position.

Point 1 - The Curse is not yet lifted
Romans 5 lets us know that Jesus is the 2nd Adam, Who will overturn the curse laid upon humanity in Genesis 3.
Do women still have pain in childbirth? Do thistles still grow in the garden? Does man still work hard to eat his bread? Does he still return to dust? Of course!
But wait - Revelation 22 tells us in v. 3 that

No longer will there be anything accursed, but the throne of God and of the Lamb will be in it, and his servants will worship him.

If this earth is the new earth, why is the creation still in bondage to decay?

Point 2 - The Resurrection is inextricably linked to Christ's Parousia (coming)
Adam and other Hymenaeans will tell you that the resurrection has already taken place, but the only way they can hold that position is to redefine drastically what "resurrection" is, and their definition ends up very far from the NT definition.
You know, Adam, Mormons believe in the "resurrection" also. It's what you mean by it.
1 Cor 15:12-57 is a bit long to post here, but here are some key parts:

v.14And if Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is in vain and your faith is in vain. 15We are even found to be misrepresenting God, because we testified about God that he raised Christ, whom he did not raise if it is true that the dead are not raised.

v.17And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile and you are still in your sins.

v.22For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive. 23But each in his own order: Christ the firstfruits, then at his coming those who belong to Christ. 24Then comes the end, when he delivers the kingdom to God the Father after destroying every rule and every authority and power.25For he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet. 26The last enemy to be destroyed is death.

v.35But someone [read: Adam] will ask, "How are the dead raised? With what kind of body do they come?"

v.50I tell you this, brothers: flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable. 51Behold! I tell you a mystery. We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, 52in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we shall be changed. 53For this perishable body must put on the imperishable, and this mortal body must put on immortality.

The resurrection occurs at the same time as the judgment, the Last Day!
John 6:39
Acts 17:30-32

Believers' bodies will be changed at the resurrection to resemble Christ's resurrected, glorified body.
Romans 6:5
Phil 3:20
Why? B/c, as 1 Cor 15 says, the perishable cannot inherit the kingdom of God.

Point 3 - Liars don't enter in

Finally, I want to note that we preach Christ crucified and resurrected. But if Adam is right, we are liars according to 1 Cor 15:15, and our faith is VAIN. I don't know why Adam claims the name "Christian", but then again I don't understand how he could hold the position he does.

Rev 21:

22And I saw no temple in the city, for its temple is the Lord God the Almighty and the Lamb. 23And the city has no need of sun or moon to shine on it, for the glory of God gives it light, and its lamp is the Lamb. 24By its light will the nations walk, and the kings of the earth will bring their glory into it, 25and its gates will never be shut by day--and there will be no night there. 26They will bring into it the glory and the honor of the nations. 27But nothing unclean will ever enter it, nor anyone who does what is detestable or false, but only those who are written in the Lamb's book of life.

But since I preach what I preach, I am a liar if Adam is right. Yet, according to him I still live in the City and all has been fulfilled, and I participate in it (albeit indirectly).
Rev 22:15 tells us that liars will not enter in.


This is a plea for Adam to repent of his false teaching, to turn and be saved. Psalm 2 (which Adam rejects as "dung"), not to mention numerous other passages in the Scriptures, tells us of the fearful wrath of the LORD as He regards the scoffers who mock Him. Adam, it is a terrifying thing to fall into the hands of the living God. Here's hoping the Holy Spirit will convict you of your sin.

A recent and perhaps upcoming conversation

So here's the story.
I was reading at Slice of Laodicea, was directed to this video, tried to comment (and Youtube swallowed all but my last comment), clicked over to Dave the video-maker's blog, commented there on the video's worrying, Emergent Church-esque postmodernist tendencies, got into a conversation, and then encountered another poster there named Adam, who is a voluminous writer (which means he writes a whole bunch).
Adam started saying some things I found very strange (and they only got worse from there), and eventually I discovered that he is a Hymenaean, or Hyper-Preterist (sometimes called a Full Preterist). It wasn't long before he said more than a few things that made it clear he was more than an interlocutor who disagreed - he is a heretic, "gangrene" in the church, whose teaching will cause "shipwreck of the faith".
Adam is the 1st Hymenaean I've ever encountered, so it was certainly interesting to read his arguments and try to wrap my brain around them. Our interaction on Dave's combox took us a bit far afield of the original topic so I invited Adam to defend his views on my blog later on when I got some more time. He said he would seriously consider doing so, and this is an invitation to respond to the next post I write, where I will respond to his posts.
Of course, he can respond to this one too, but I don't have time to lay out much argument now. I hope to get to it w/in 4-5 days.
As always, I don't delete or police comments, and this time I may have met more than my match in terms of verbosity.

I plan to bring up questions relating to the resurrection, since it is the most disturbing and heretical of his beliefs. Call it a teaser, Adam. Hopefully it will be a good time.

At least one judge in Germany thinks consistently

This story cracks me up. I haven't completely worked out in my mind all the implications of believing the judge did the right or wrong thing, but you have to say that she was acting consistently.

So disingenuous but so funny!

Saw this here while reading thru the other interactions with it here and here.
The logical problems w/ it are manifold (including, but not limited to, the fact that even if the Roman Catholic Magisterium is infallible, you the private individual still have to interpret the maze of Canon law and Church decrees and encyclicals, and you are very fallible) but the picture is really funny. Click on it and it'll take you to the one of the original posts in the conversation.

Just a little computer info

I just wanted to let you know about this.
Just in case it happens, you'll be prepared.

A gem of an exchange

Between Madalyn Murray O'Hair, atheist and heroine of secularism, and Walter Martin, the late founder of the Christian Research Institute...

From this page, this file, at minute 23:

Walter Martin: You admit that from nothing, nothing comes, correct?
Madalyn Murray O'Hair: No, I don't admit anything.
WM: Good heavens, woman, you must admit that from nothing nothing will come.
MMO: If you said, this is your statement...
WM: Will you admit it?
MMO: I have no idea...if...
WM: Oh, this is absurd.
MMO: No, this is not absurd!