First the Question: Christ, in heaven, is the only priest that any believer needs. True or False?
Take a moment to respond at the LLM Question of the Day
And now the answer to the LLM Question of 6-10-2012
Question: The Apostle Peter had absolutely NO apostolic authority over the Apostle Paul. True or False?
Answer: TRUE! Someone has said, if, in Galatians 2:1-14, Peter was a Roman Catholic, Paul surely was a Protestant. Peter had absolutely NO apostolic authority over Paul. Peter added nothing to Paul; but CONTRARIWISE, see Galatians 2:6-7. Now, out of the 803 responses we received to this question, a whopping 94.1% of you got it right! Therefore, NOW, let us take a look at,
What Does the Roman Catholic Bible Teach About Roman Catholicism? Part 6 of 7
WHAT ABOUT THE REMISSION OF SINS
How did the Apostle Peter REMIT SINS? When Peter and Cornelius with his company met, surely Peter did not hold out a ringed finger for Cornelius to kiss, but said to Cornelius, “stand up, for I also am a man:” (Acts 10:26).
As we said, so far as we have any record in any Bible, Cornelius and his company were the only Gentiles to whom Peter ministered. Of course, we do not say that he did not preach to others, but we do state that it is significant that no others are mentioned by name, that he did agree to go to the Jews (Galatians 2:9). However, the Apostle Paul mentioned many Gentiles. But note how Peter remitted their sins, and you will know that any twelve year old saved Christian can today remit the sins of any sinner in the same manner. Read Acts 10:39-40, that Christ was nailed to the tree and raised from the dead, and then Peter added, “To Him give all the prophets witness, that through HIS NAME (THE LORD JESUS CHRIST) whosoever believeth in HIM shall receive remission of sins!” (Acts 10:43).And there it is! There is NO priest or pope here forgiving sins, or mass, or beads, or holy water, or confessional or penance, except as God granted to Cornelius repentance unto life (Acts 11:18). Cornelius and his company received the Holy Spirit and salvation BEFORE they received water baptism. (Acts 10:44-48). I do not see any water christening here to take away original sin. Do you?
WHAT ABOUT APOSTOLIC SUCCESSION
We have the one and only case of APOSTOLIC SUCCESSION mentioned in the Roman Catholic Bible in Acts 1:20, “his bishopric let another take.” Then after the casting of lots for the successor of Judas, Matthias was numbered with the eleven apostles. (Acts 1:26). TWELVE apostles stood up on the day of Pentecost. (Acts 2:14) God did not permit the number ‘TWELVE’ to be reduced to ‘ELEVEN’ (by the death of James in Acts 12:1-2) until Peter had used the KEYS OF THE KINGDOM to the House of Israel and the House of Cornelius.
‘TWELVE’ is the number of God’s ‘KINGDOM’ nation, ‘ISRAEL’. ‘ONE’, the number used by the Apostle Paul, to whom the RISEN Christ revealed the hope and calling of members of the Church which is Christ’s Body, is the number of that Church, in Grace. This number ‘ONE’ is mentioned by the Holy Spirit in Paul’s Writings more than twenty times. It was through Paul that the LORD made known that He would not make the NEW ISRAEL of Isaiah 62:1-5 until He had completed and glorified ‘THE ONE NEW MAN’ of Ephesians 2:15. (Romans 11:25-26). Isn’t that MARVELOUS! Praise the LORD!
With the death of James, one of the ‘TWELVE’, the LORD was ready for the Apostle Paul to go forth, independent of the ‘TWELVE’, with the LORD’s new program. (Acts 13:2). God was getting ready to cast away Israel, temporarily, (Romans 11:15) and inaugurate ‘THE DISPENSATION OF THE GRACE OF GOD’ (Ephesians 3:1-3) through ‘THE APOSTLE OF THE GENTILES’, who declared that a ‘DISPENSATION’ was committed to him. (1 Corinthians 9:17; Colossians 1:24-26). Therefore, no successor was required by the LORD to take the place of the second apostle of the ‘TWELVE’ to die, as in the case of the first (Judas).
There is a hint at apostolic succession in Paul’s farewell words to Timothy when Paul wrote Timothy to pass on, his (Paul’s) teachings to others, who in turn were to perpetuate ‘the deposit’ committed to Paul. (Break out your Lexicons and see the Greek of 2 Timothy 1:12). Read carefully Paul’s words to Timothy in 2 Timothy 2:1-9.
The Roman Catholics have made the great blunder that so many evangelical Christians have made. That is IGNORING the Apostle Paul’s instructions to Timothy, and failing to obey Ephesians 3:9, making God’s saints to see what is ‘THE DISPENSATION OF THE MYSTERY’. They have utterly confused the Apostle Peter’s Kingdom Keys, and Kingdom message, the building of the TABERNACLE OF DAVID, Peter’s message to the God fearing, devout, Jew loving, seeking, Cornelius, with GOD’S NEW DEAL for the human race in 2 Cor. 5:16-21; Romans 11:15; Ephesians 2:15, Paul’s Christ given ‘DISPENSATION’ and the new program of Ephesians 4:7-14, THE BUILDING UP OF THE BODY; THE PERFECT MAN.
Therefore, they have been numbered with the religious church members mentioned in Ephesians 4:14, “gone with the wind.” They are described as babes in Hebrews 5:11-14, and have NOT gone on to perfection. (Hebrews 6:1; Ephesians 4:12; 1 Corinthians 13:8-11). Christians, who build intelligently with God in this current Dispensation of Grace, must give heed to 1 Corinthians 3:10, and go to the Apostle Paul, rather than to the Apostle Peter, for God’s blueprints and specifications, not fixing the open ‘Faith’ door for Gentiles of Acts 14:27 at Israel’s Pentecost of Acts 2, BUT RATHER after the apostles were reduced from TWELVE to ELEVEN.
Someone has said, if, in Galatians 2:1-14, Peter was a Roman Catholic, Paul surely was a Protestant. Peter had absolutely NO apostolic authority over Paul. Peter added nothing to Paul; but CONTRARIWISE, (Galatians 2:6-7). The LORD’s ‘Grace’ message by the Apostle Paul was, “By Grace are ye saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; not of works.” (Ephesians 2:8-9). “Not by works of righteousness which we have done.” (Titus 3:5-8). All who were thus saved by Grace, baptized into the one true BIBLE CHURCH, made a part of the ONE NEW MAN of Ephesians 2:15, added by the LORD to the CHURCH, were God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works. (Ephesians 2:10).
We challenge any Roman Catholic to prove by the writings of the Apostle Paul in the Roman Catholic Bible that a Gentile had to do one good deed or obey any ritual of an organization to be saved or become a member of the one true Bible Church after the RISEN Christ directed the Apostle Paul to make known the Gospel of the Grace of God (Acts 20:24), which gospel Paul did NOT receive from the Apostle Peter, but by direct revelation from the RISEN Christ in heaven. (Galatians 1:9-12).
AND WHAT ABOUT MARY
Less than two months after the resurrection of the LORD Jesus Christ, Peter and the other Eleven apostles, and more than one hundred other disciples of the Savior were in Jerusalem waiting for the descent and outpouring of the Holy Spirit in obedience to Luke 24:49.
Among the one hundred and twenty was Mary, the mother of the LORD Jesus. (Acts 1:13-15). In Acts 1:14 we have the last mention in the Roman Catholic Bible of Mary. There is no Bible record of her death or when she became a member of the Body of 1 Corinthians 12:13, or that she is now more than a disembodied spirit in heaven, awaiting the resurrection of the saints when the blessed hope of 1 Thessalonians 4:13-18 or Titus 2:13 takes place.
There is not one single statement in the Roman Catholic Bible to support their teaching that Mary in a glorified body is an intercessor in heaven or that any member of the Body of Christ, the Age of Grace Church, should pray to her or through her.
The Bible clearly teaches that “THERE IS ONE MEDIATOR BETWEEN GOD AND MEN, THE MAN CHRIST JESUS” (1 Timothy 2:4-6); that if Christ were on earth He would not be a priest (Hebrews 8:4), because our LORD Jesus Christ came from the Tribe of Judah, and God’s priests on earth came from the Tribe of Levi. (Hebrews 7:14). God’s death judgment is pronounced upon any not of the tribe of Levi who usurp the office of priest. (Numbers 18:7). In this connection God’s word, spoken by the LORD Jesus, and recorded in the Roman Catholic Bible is very, very plain, “call NO man on earth your father.” (Matthew 23:9). The context and all of the Scriptures reveal that this command of the LORD applies definitely to Roman Catholic priests, including archbishops, cardinals and the pope.
We challenge the Roman Catholics to prove by the Roman Catholic Bible that there were any cardinals or popes in the Bible Church mentioned in the Writings of the Apostles. Peter called Mark his son (1 Peter 5:13), as Paul called Timothy his son (1 Timothy 1:2). When a believing sinner is saved under the preaching of some servant of the LORD, the saved one is referred to as the preacher’s spiritual son. We note in the Roman Catholic Bible, in the very same chapter where Peter calls Mark his son, that Peter called himself an elder (the Greek word is not ‘priest’) and he instructed younger and elder to be subject one to another (1 Peter 5:5), just as James wrote, “confess your sins one to another” (James 5:16); NOT to those who claim to be a special order of priests. The function of a priest is to present man to God: the function of a preacher is to present God (in The LORD Jesus Christ) to man. Every member of the Body of Christ is instructed to intercede for every other member, but through the one Priest in heaven, the LORD Jesus Christ. (Ephesians 6:18; Hebrews 7:25; Hebrews 8:1 and Hebrews 6:20). The priestly work of the LORD Jesus Christ is recorded in the Roman Catholic Bible in the seventeenth chapter of John’s Gospel. Roman Catholics should read Christ’s words to Mary in John 2:4 and then Mary’s word for them to obey Christ in John 2:5.
The Roman Catholic Bible does not teach that the Church is the door to Christ, as the Roman Catholics Hierarchy teach, but that the LORD Jesus Christ is the door to the Church; that the very moment the sinner receives Christ as his own individual, personal Savior, meeting God at Calvary, he becomes a member of the Body of Christ, is immediately identified with Christ in His third baptism, (his death on the cross (Luke 12:50), is buried with Him, is raised to walk in newness of life, (Romans 6:3-6), is seated with Him in the Heavenlies (Ephesians 2:6), there blessed with all spiritual blessings (Ephesians 1:3), is then and there joined to Christ and to every member of His Church (Body) in an inseparable, unbreakable, and eternal union and is complete in Christ (Colossians 2:10) (Romans 12:3-5). All of these glorious and blessed truths are taught in the Roman Catholic Bible, and that Bible also teaches that a person must receive the Holy Spirit before he can understand or with assurance claim these blessed experiences. (1 Corinthians 2:14).
This 7 part series of messages, "What Does the Roman Catholic Bible Teach About Roman Catholicism", should enable all of you to REFUTE the claim by Roman Catholics that God’s program for this Age and Dispensation, with their visible head or vicar of Christ, their college of cardinals, and their order of high and low priests, is being carried on by the Roman Catholic Church, and that their Church was the very first New Testament Church.
Every Bible Christian believes in the virgin birth and the eternal Deity of the LORD Jesus Christ, in Whom dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily, (Colossians 2:9); but no Christian, who is a spiritual, intelligent student of the Bible, believes that God performed a miracle to make the Virgin Mary immaculate or sinless to give birth to the sinless Christ or that she remained a virgin after Christ was born. That’s beyond ridiculous.
Mary was conceived in sin and shapen in iniquity, just like you or I before becoming a member of the Body of Christ, and had to receive Christ at Calvary for her redemption and soul cleansing. The Romans Catholic religious teaching concerning Mary, whether called superstition or fiction, is surely, and absolutely, contrary to the plain teaching IN the Roman Catholic Bible.
All that the Roman Catholic Church teaches that is CONTRARY to the doctrines taught by intelligent, spiritual, Dispensation of Grace obedient Christians, (Ephesians 3:9), is contrary to the plain teaching in the Roman Catholic Bible.
The Roman Catholic Bible is the best answer to the false doctrines taught by the Roman Catholic Church Organization.
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In Ephesians 1:13 the Holy Spirit through the Apostle Paul declares that men are saved and sealed by hearing and BELIEVING the Word of Truth, the Gospel of your Salvation. Therefore, here, now, is declared unto you the Word of Truth, the Gospel of your Salvation: "that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures; and that he was buried, and that he rose again the third day according to the scriptures" 1 Corinthians 15:3-4. BELIEVE today. The time is short.
So There You Have it!
Spread this message to everyone you know, far and wide.
Grace be to you and peace, from God: our Father, and The LORD Jesus Christ.
In The LORD Jesus Christ,
The Lion and Lamb Ministry
Pastor David Picos, D.D.
Minister and Ambassador for Christ in the Ministry of Reconciliation (2 Cor. 5:18-20)
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