(The following is a series of correspondence with a person who read my website postings about Extreme Legalism and Christmas, and who also contended that giving gifts is idolatry whether or not one consciously worships a deity through gift giving. The following contains only the words I sent in response to the person's email correspondence with me, and includes only the words he/she wrote to me which I used in my return correspondence. The only deletions that have been made are the mention of others' names and references to non-issue points. Notice that this person refused to give his/her name throughout the correspondence. And whereas it is not my habit to give you, the reader of these posts, the other persons' names, due to this person's boldness and personal attacks of myself, I encouraged the individual to put the individual's name alongside their words. This never occurred, and to this day I do not know who sent these email notes to me. Consistent with the others with whom I conversed, this individual was unable to show that idolatry is committed whether or not a person consciously worships an idol in their questioned actions. Again, let me say it is extreme legalism to accuse people of idolatry by the appearance of their actions without any regard whatsoever to the presence of intentional and conscious worship in their hearts towards an idol. Gift giving is in and of itself innocent. And to accuse me or you of idolatry simply because we give gifts to others on December 25 is to stand in danger of very severe and serious judgment from our Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ. It is blatant false witness to do so. I pray these postings about this issue help us all to ever be careful to not judge others by appearances only.)
I have distinguished the individual's words, who wrote to me, and his/her quotes of my words, from my own responses by the following format using the bullet sign for his/her words:
After perusing your feeble attempt at justifying your self-righteous attitude on the subject of Xmas, and your degrading of the alleged vocal minority, I desire to respond to the following interesting quote you made, that I copied below:
Without any more chat about this than is necessary, do you call the days of the week "Sunday, Monday, Tuesday?" If so, you are working against yourself and are inconsistent.
And if you disagree with my point that it is not idolatry unless there is a conscious worship of the idol, then you are judgmental erringly beyond what I can describe. Let us address these issues first. I will engage a chat with you if you like. But beware, I cannot stand erring judgmentalism.
(After sending me information background on the origin of gift giving during Christmas time, and the pagan origins of such activities in response to pagan belief of the need to worship these deities through christmas customs (which I personally agree are proofs that christmas celebrations did indeed come from paganism), I responded as follows:)
All your background of gift giving is simply moot when you consider that unless there is the conscious worship of an idol then it is simply not idolatry. That is the real issue. Please address this to me. WHAT IS IDOLATRY?
Mike Blume wrote: "Without any more chat about this than is necessary, do you call the days of the week 'Sunday, Monday, Tuesday?' If so, you are working against yourself and are inconsistent.
If you desire to discuss other forms of paganism at a later date, I will engage you accordingly, However, the discussion at the present is XMas gift giving, and as I had anticipated, your resounding "voice of the silent majority" has failed to SCRIPTURALLY denounce your anti-biblical theories. Can you not justify your position WITHOUT emotionalism, and attempting to muddy the water by carrying this discussion another direction? Please stay with the topic for which you publicly assail.
Well, the first post I ever receive from you calls me "self-righteous" and now you say "anti-biblical theories." Really nice introduction of yourself, brother! But I see this in all legalists. The venom of personal attack is among them all. They say "Hate sin!" which is good, but their problem is that they never seem to show love of God to each other. The truth is that Jesus was full of grace and truth. And notice that grace was stressed first. that does not nullify truth, but balances truth.
The only people Jesus became angry with was the religious hypocrites and pharisees. And I feel the same anger coming on.
The entire point I brought up in my posts on my site about gift giving and christmas was that it is extreme legalism to accuse a person of idolatry simply because they give a gift on Dec. 25 as pagans honoured their gods at that time of year by giving gifts, although no thought of honouring false gods is in the hearts of gift givers. So that is the main issue. And if you want to chat with me further about this, then stop attacking ME as a person and other Pentecostals and Apostolics, and hit the issue I was addressing.
(It is always the case that those who despise a message attack the messenger rather than the message. You could not email me without attacking my character.)
Since you addressed my posts and since my posts stressed the basic thought of accusing those who without conscious effort to worship a false god as being idolaters anyhow, then stick to this major, core point.
The folks with whom I conversed did the same thing you are trying to do. They refused to address the issue of what is idolatry because they could not do so. They did not know how to refute what I said. If you are so well versed in the Bible, then address what these others could not address: WHAT IS IDOLATRY. But so far you simply have gotten away from my point. In fact, I sent the others an article called WHAT IS IDOLATRY and addressed the issue of idolatry being conscious worship of an idol. I even saved them the bother of getting out a dictionary and defining the term IDOLATRY. And I challenged their accusations of saying that people who give gifts are idolaters although these people do not consciously worship any false God, any more than Paul worshipped a false deity by eating meat that was supposedly offered to that deity. You ignore this issue and so did they. It seems this is a common error of extreme legalists. They care not what is in the heart of a person and what is the intention, but they believe that innocent actions that are no more meant to honour a false god than anything are simply idolatrous actions.
If we lifted our hands and mimicked the people who truly praise God from their hearts and lift up their hands, and yet we have no heart-felt or heart-sourced praise whatsoever in our hearts, then you and I both know that such praise is not praise at all in God's eyes. But it is simply inconsistency to say that an action without heart's intent toward a deity is nevertheless idolatry. That is the one point you and all others who forbid gift giving on Dec. 25 have overlooked.
So if you want to chat, we will chat first about the definition of idolatry and whether or not one is an idolater if one has absolutely no conscious effort to worship an idol. If you cannot do this, then drop the chat now.
"And if you disagree with my point that it is not idolatry unless there is a conscious worship of the idol, then you are judgmental erringly beyond what I can describe. Let us address THESE issues first. I will engage a chat with you if you like. But beware, I cannot stand erring judgmentalism."
"erring judgmentalism" --- Those are strong words to describe someone who has produced more scripture to satisfy the beliefs of biblical doctrine than the "voice of the silent majority". The reason this world, and unfortunately, some Apostolics and Pentecostals, have such a distaste for the doctrines of the Holy Writ is because it IS FULL of judgmentalism.
I said erring judgmentalism. God is just and His word judges sin. But to accuse people of worshipping idols when they simply have no conscious intent on doing so whatsoever, is to erringly judge. And I stand by my words. And I declare that
you shall stand before God for such false accusation. Take heed. Your accusations of people as being idolaters without their conscious intentions to worship any idol whatsoever will be brought before you one day by the Almighty.As to the "erring" part, I'm sure your ability to produce a multitude of scripture in which to base your theory upon, will prove to be correct, but until then, the word "erring" must be applied to your public portrayal of mere emotionalism, and "polly-parroting" erroneous "silent majority" seminary teachings.
It is a "theory" that idolatry is conscious and intentional worship of an idol? Where has reason and the meaning of words gone in your world? (And try to avoid the childish tripe of fancy titles for those you consider to be lower than yourself.)
Cannot you give your real name?
Anyhow, every single scripture that speaks against idolatry speaks of people who consciously worship an idol.
Since you want a list of scriptures to impress you, here they are:
Leviticus 19:4 Turn ye not unto idols, nor make to yourselves molten gods: I [am] the LORD your God.
What is an idol? An image that is consciously worshipped as the form of a god.
Leviticus 26:1 Ye shall make you no idols nor graven image, neither rear you up a standing image, neither shall ye set up [any] image of stone in your land, to bow down unto it: for I [am] the LORD your God.
Bowing down to an idol is conscious worship and obeisance to it.
2Kin 17:12 For they served idols, whereof the LORD had said unto them, Ye shall not do this thing.
Serving an idol is consciously honouring it as a deity.
Let me just say that there are no scriptures in the Bible that speak of idolatry without the conscious and intentional worship of a deity through that image. I challenge you to show me some that do.
Do you want to discuss the definition of IDOLATRY or go the way of the others? If you can't produce then do not even respond any more.
In the meantime, read a dictionary for preparation.
Background? If background mixed and supported by, scripture, isn't sufficient, then all the commentaries and the writings of Josephus need to be scraped. In fact, 98% of all of your bible college training is moot, as it deals specifically with background and history. Surely you are beyond such an elementary statement.
It is moot because it does not address my core point in my notes posted at my site. All the pagan rituals of giving gifts on certain days done in conscious effort to worship an idol are simply not idolatry if one gives gifts without conscious effort to praise a deity.
I am to assume then, that you find no fault in Halloween, as long as it is "consciously" done as pleasure for the children and not in worship to it's founder? Surely you do not teach this doctrine to your flock!!!!
No I do not. I am talking about innocently giving gifts. But I will say that a child who asks for candy on that night while dressed in a princess mask is not committing satan worship.
Before this discussion can continue, I likewise, need you to define "conscious worship". I caution you, to not stray from the Word of God in this Defining attempt.
Conscious worship is simply intentional obeisance to a deity with full awareness that the effort is done to serve and honour that god or goddess which is in reality not a god or goddess at all.
"of an idol then it is simply not idolatry. That is the real issue. Please address this to me. WHAT IS IDOLATRY?"
I am humored that you would ask such. I've noticed your name appearing on ____'s webpage, and given that association, along with _______ etc..., I must assume that you conjoin with their biblical philosophy. In doing so, just an infinitesimal amount of study would reveal that most of the Idolatry found in the New Testament was dealing with Caballism and it's mystical beliefs and worship which God thoroughly and convincingly hates..
Col 3:5 Mortify therefore your members which are upon the earth; fornication, uncleanness, inordinate affection, evil concupiscence, and covetousness, which is idolatry:
That is nonsense. Covetousness is not cabalistic. I agree that cabbala is devilish and evil from the roots up, but to say every reference to covetousness in the New Testament is actually a reference to the cabala is nonsense. You must agree, do you not?
Acts 17:16 Now while Paul waited for them at Athens, his spirit was stirred in him, when he saw the city wholly given to idolatry.
What things, were the city engaged in, that raised the ire of Paul? (I would ask you to NOT use background or history, but that is impossible, so I won't place that burden upon you). It was Cabalistic, pagan worship.
Given this knowledge, please, before you delve to deep into this XMas gift giving topic, do just a little research, (sorry, that does involve background and history), and you will find that the entire issue and substance of XMas: trees, lights, decorations, santa claus, the nativity scene, gift giving, etc... aka: pagan worship, is ALL, TOTALLY, and COMPLETELY, steeped in Caballism straight out of Babylon.
But what about people who have nothing to do with honouring any false god through these things, but simply do it for decoration? Is their lack of intentional honouring of a deity still idolatry? THAT is the main question that you folks never answer. Will you also avoid it?
You cannot admit that XMas is pagan, as you have done, and at the same time arbitrarily decide that a certain part is deemed not pagan because it is something you enjoy.
As if that was why I said what I said. You are missing my point, Dance all around it if you will, but the point is that a thing is not idolatry if there is no conscious worship of an idol involved. It is silly to say otherwise.
It is easy to preach against things that you do not like or enjoy, but it is difficult when it comes to something that the flesh longs for.
The ONLY way your argument could hold any water at all, is if you somehow chose, without any knowledge of XMas at all (given your admittance about this issue in the other e-mail, this is impossible for you) , December 25th as a time, for no special reason at all, to give and receive gifts. I don't think you, as a student of Scripture, or any other pseudo-christian, could claim such innocence.
Wrong. The argument holds water simply based upon the definition of Idolatry. And I respond to you that your argument holds no water at all since you ignore the point of idolatry being intentional worship of an idol.
Saying that you could participate in part of the cabalistic ritual of XMas, and be completely innocent of pagan worship, is like saying that you can pick and chose what part of the Bible you want to apply to your life and disregard the remaining without guilt.
Nonsense. Paul ate the very meat that was distinctly known by him to be offered to idols, but since eating meat for food is innocent in and of itself, he ate it without any qualms. Same with giving gifts. Giving gifts is in and of itself innocent. Who cares if others did it to honour gods? Not Paul.
Answer this:
Did or did not Paul know that the meat he ate was offered to idols?
Is eating meat innocent in and of itself?
Is giving gifts innocent in and of itself?
I am interested to see if you even answer these questions.
I can assure you that you have not taken this issue to real prayer, with an open, honest heart, and a burden for TRUTH, for if you had; and I pray that you do, for my contention is not to see who is right or wrong, but rather to stir both of us to genuinely hear from God, in the spirit of prayer; I am persuaded to believe that God would let you know that He rarely marches in goose step with the "majority".
"So if you want to chat, we will chat first about the definition of idolatry and whether or not one is an idolater if one has absolutely no conscious effort to worship an idol. If you cannot do this, then drop the chat now."
Your self-justifying tripe humors me. If one is truly interested and hungry for truth, then I always welcome dialogue, however, sidestepping the issue by playing semantics in order to justify your loop-hole doctrine is child's play at best.
You avoid the entire issue just like everyone else in your group did. You cannot answer my question as to whether or not a thing is IDOLATRY if there is no conscious worship of an idol involved.
You still refuse to give your name. I can only assume you are ashamed of what you believe. If you cannot put your name to your posts then you are simply either deceptive, or else ashamed to stand up behind what you believe. Anyone can hide behind an alias and say bold things. This is a clear indication of the spirit of ku klux klan types who boldly went around in their prejudice and wore masks to hide their identities. Same spirit. Put your name where your mouth is.
To answer your above question and allow the rubber to meet the road, whether you like it or agree with it or not, you, Mike Blume, cannot, given your earlier admissions and quoted statements, claim in any form or fashion, that you personally are able to partake of the act of gift giving on December 25th or any time during the XMas season, and claim you are not conscious, or are oblivious to it's pagan properties.
I like how you can distort. Wow!! What a twist of what I said! I said that giving these things on that date without conscious and intentional worship of a deity is innocent. Because giving gifts in and of itself is innocent. A pagan god does not even enter my mind when I give gifts. And it is extreme legalism, and you are such a legalist, to say that the similarity of a pagan act is evil. You do not care what the intention is and whether or not a thing is innocent in and of itself.
I did not say whether I am "conscious of its pagan properties". You build straw-man argument instead of addressing my point of intentional and conscious worship of an idol. I said it is paganism only when there is conscious and intentional effort put forth to actually praise a deity using those actions. You say intent does not matter. And the funny thing is that you say this about gift-giving which is innocent in and of itself!
It is one thing to have a personal conviction and feel you should not do so yourself, but you are accusing me and everyone else of being idolaters and demand us to go by your little whims.
Legalists are hateful within their spirits and self-righteously exalt themselves as being better because of what they do or do not do. They ignore the all important element of the heart and the intentions of the heart. They only judge by the seeing of the eyes and the hearing ofd the ears -- physical and outward appearances of things that are outwardly done, with no regard at all to the possibility of total lack of any idolatrous intentions.
To disregard intentions of the heart, especially in the matters of doing things that are in and of themselves innocent, like giving gifts, and accuse a person of worshipping an idol, is simply ridiculous beyond all imagination and utterly nonsensical, and extremely legalistic.
Thank God that He is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart. I would not want to be judged, however much you wish to judge me, of you judging us all. You judge after the appearance and by the eyes.
Isai 11:3 And shall make him of quick understanding in the fear of the LORD: and he shall not judge after the sight of his eyes, neither reprove after the hearing of his ears: Isai 11:4 But with righteousness shall he judge the poor, and reprove with equity for the meek of the earth: and he shall smite the earth with the rod of his mouth, and with the breath of his lips shall he slay the wicked.
John 7:24 Judge not according to the appearance, but judge righteous judgment.
John 8:15 Ye judge after the flesh; I judge no man. John 8:16 And yet if I judge, my judgment is true: for I am not alone, but I and the Father that sent me.
1Cor 2:13 Which things also we speak, not in the words which man's wisdom teacheth, but which the Holy Ghost teacheth; comparing spiritual things with spiritual. 1Cor 2:14 But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know [them], because they are spiritually discerned. 1Cor 2:15 But he that is spiritual judgeth all things, yet he himself is judged of no man.
It is true spirituality to be able to judge not after appearances and outward action alone, and it is utterly carnal to judge by outward actions especially when the outward actions are in and of themselves innocent like gift giving. I cannot say how wicked such judgment is. Unrighteous judgment. Judging by the eyes.
The Bible says that love hopeth all things. That means that when a person is seen to do things that either could be distinguished as similar to pagan acts, and therefore the chance of true pagan conscious worship is in their hearts, or the actions could easily be interpreted as being innocent in and of themselves, love hopes for the best. But here you and other extreme legalists take the worst possible scenario of the two and say they are idolaters. Forget about what intentions are in the hearts! You say that since others gave gifts at that date in december in order to honour gods, then anyone who hands a person another gift on that date is an idolater whether they do it to worship another god or not. You have no love of God, for you do not hope for the best, but wickedly judge according to what you see, and that is final judgment as far as you are concerned.
And do not respond that love condones sin, as though I condoned sin according to that above statement. I hate sin and would never condone it. But be decent enough to see my point and what scripture is trying to say that you are not to judge by simply observing an innocent action and looking for a pagan connection to it, without regard as to whether or not the person you judge is intentionally worshipping any pagan god.
Let me quote my last post to you.
"Conscious worship is simply intentional obeisance to a deity with full awareness that the effort is done to serve and honour that god or goddess which is in reality not a god or goddess at all."
I repeat: "Conscious worship is simply intentional obeisance to a deity with full awareness that the effort is done to serve and honour that god or goddess which is in reality not a god or goddess at all."
Did you get it yet?
If I intentionally worship an idol and am consciously acting in order to give praise to a god or goddess, then and only then is it idolatry. Read that again very slowly.
You, sir, do not qualify under the category of one who "has absolutely no conscious effort to worship an idol." Your previous e-mails are laced with an abundance of admissions as to the paganism of XMas.
You seriously do not know the difference between English words. Conscious admission of paganism is totally different from the conscious worship of idols. I said nothing about conscious admission of paganism involved. At least the others did not twist what I said, but simply avoided it.
I caution your blasphemous attempt to discredit truth by slinging insults such as "extremism, and legalism". Truth, by any other name or accusation, is still Truth!
I wish you knew what the truth of the term idolatry is, for your false accusations of idolatry against people who in no way at all consciously worship idols is extremely evil. You will meet God on that one day. You bear false witness.
Allow me to conclude this correspondence with SCRIPTURE, not addressed to the general public, but to the individual, Mike Blume:
1Thessalonians 5:22 Abstain from all appearance of evil. (And by your own admission, you know the paganism concerning ALL of XMas)
But the fact is that giving gifts on that date is not considered as an appearance of evil to anyone but you witch-hunters who spend more time telling people they are doing wrong then telling them about Jesus Christ. Granted I tell people they are wrong if they are in sin, but I speak MORE about Jesus Christ to them.
So the issue is the APPEARANCE of evil. What does appearance mean?
James 4:17 Therefore to him that knoweth to do good (and by your own admission, your > aware of the paganism of XMas), and doeth it not, to him it is sin.
This is another distortion of the scriptures, because Paul knew that meat was offered to idols, and yet he still ate it. But eating meat in and of itself is not bad nor evil. So he continued eating it that way. Same with giving gifts. It is innocent in and of itself.
I see you failed to respond to my questions:
And you lived up to my expectations to not even attempt to answer them:
"Answer this:
"Did or did not Paul know that the meat he ate was offered to idols?
"Is eating meat innocent in and of itself?
"Is giving gifts innocent in and of itself?
"I am interested to see if you even answer these questions."
Hebrews 10:26 For if we sin wilfully after that we have received the knowledge of the truth (and by your own admission, you know the truth about the paganism of XMas), there remaineth no more sacrifice for sins,
If it is a sin to give gifts to people then it is a sin to eat meat offered to idols, for Paul consciously knew the pagan involvement that meat had. But that is not the issue for Paul was not consciously worshipping any idol but simply eating food. Same with gift giving. You do not want to address that issue, though, for you refused to answer my questions like so many others.
To say it is a sin to give gifts is again to falsely charge in a very evil manner, and you will come good for that at the judgment.
Thank God there is hope though: I Jn 2:1-4 My little children, these things write I unto you, that ye sin not. And if any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous: And he is the propitiation for our sins: and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world. And hereby we do know that we know him, if we keep his commandments. He that saith, I know him, and keepeth not his commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him.
WORSHIP: Obeisance of a god or goddess, praise of a deity.
Is it worship when you do not have any inkling in your heart that you even desire to worship that deity? No. It is a silly to say that you are consciously praising a deity when you are not consciously praising a deity as it is to say you are worshipping if you are not worshipping. Words have lost all meaning to you folks.
for the LORD, whose name is Jealous, is a jealous God: (Remember, this commandment was given to the type, the Jews, of the church)
And it involved WORSHIP of a god. And it is simply not worship when there is not conscious effort.
Again, you would not call it worship to God if you raised your hands to copy others who do it and yet did not have anything in your heart going forth to God, but simply did an action. Yet you hypocritically say that it is worship when a person does the same action as a pagan who consciously worships a deity through that action. That kind of blindness to inconsistency simply tells me you are not even reasonable.
Deliver us from unreasonable men!
If your definition of Idolatry is: the conscious worship of an idol, then we are allowed to make a quantum leap of assumption that the UNCONSCIOUS worship of an idol has God's approval? SCRIPTURE PLEASE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
The whole point is that it is not worship if the element of conscious effort towards praising a deity is not present. By your silly reasoning, people who have plants in their homes are idolaters because Pantheists consciously worship plants and put them in their homes to bow down to them each day.
It is an oxymoron to put the two words together "unconscious worship." It simply is not worship if it is done unconsciously for the purpose of worship.
Here is the definition of worship again.
THE ADORATION HOMAGE OR VENERATION GIVEN TO A DEITY.
Now, where pray tell do you see the idea that it does not have to be conscious adoration in order for a thing to still be worship? What dictionary did you read? I you were right it would say,
THE ADORATION, HOMAGE OR VENERATION GIVEN TO A DEITY WHETHER DONE CONSCIOUSLY AND INTENTIONALLY FOR THE PURPOSE OF SUCH ADORATION OR NOT. THE ACTION OF DOING WHAT CONSCIOUS WORSHIPERS DO, YET WITHOUT CONSCIOUS EFFORTS TO ACTUALLY PRAISE.
Sounds fancy, but is simply folly to the extreme.
And just in case that wasn't sufficient: John 16:13 ....the Spirit of truth,... will guide you into all truth: (By your own admission XMas is pagan. If so, would the Spirit of TRUTH lead you into paganism and idol worship?)
The Spirit of truth did not lead me into conscious worship and praise of an idol and pagan practices of worshipping false gods. Until you learn what worship really is, for you obviously do not know, then you will never realize the truth of the issue.
Isaiah 11:3 And shall make him of quick understanding in the fear of the LORD: and he shall not judge after the sight of his eyes, neither reprove after the hearing of his ears: Isai 11:4 But with righteousness shall he judge the poor, and reprove with equity for the meek of the earth: and he shall smite the earth with the rod of his mouth, and with the breath of his lips shall he slay the wicked.
John 7:24 Judge not according to the appearance, but judge righteous judgment.
John 8:15 Ye judge after the flesh; I judge no man.
John 8:16 And yet if I judge, my judgment is true: for I am not alone, but I and the Father that sent me.
1 Corinthians 2:13-15 Which things also we speak, not
in the words which man's wisdom teacheth, but which the Holy Ghost teacheth;
comparing spiritual things with spiritual. But the natural man receiveth
not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him:
neither can he know [them], because they are spiritually discerned. But he that is spiritual judgeth
all things, yet he himself is judged of no man.
The only correct judgment is the judgment that does so not after appearances, as you are presently doing.
Since you lived up to my expectations of not responding to my questions, I give you one more chance to answer my questions listed earlier in this post for the second time to you. Should I hold my breath?
Well, I have another series to post on my website to show extreme legalism. And I will put my name to it! If you are so bold with your name as without your name attached to these emails you sent me, one thinks you would tell me your name so that others would know on my website who you are. Are you ashamed of what you believe? So far I still do not know who you are. I really want to see what you will say to that! I would let you put my name with my emails if you wish to post this, if you will not remove or add to the debate as is. But I imagine you will still be cowardly enough to never attach your name to me even in private chat!!!
God, give us men who will stand behind their words!