Quote:
Originally Posted by Sister Alvear
and leave the village to die without the saving knowledge of Christ?
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Who holds the key to death and hell? You? Me? The Church? Or Jesus?
What can anyone do that Christ Himself cannot do? Who draws souls to the Father? The Spirit or the Bride? Who was lifted up so the world will come to the cross? Jesus or the Church?
Do we offend God and the Word by overstepping our bounds and reducing ourselves to fulfilling things He has not only not called us to do, but in fact has commanded us not to do, just so His will, in our minds, can be fulfilled?
What, for example, should a man do, if and when there is no woman present? Fulfill the role of a woman? We know this to be absurd. But if no man is present, but only a woman, we think, hey, it's gotta get done, so go for it? Would you have a man fulfill
Titus 2:3-5 if no elder woman was present? Should widowers be placed on the church dole per
1 Timothy 5:9-11?
It doesn't work like that. If you comb the Scriptures and see where anyone overstepped their bounds of authority to do things their own way, they inevitably were punished by God.
Nothing has changed.
The Tabernacle and then the Temple are types for the Church. Imagine if anyone responsible for either the Tabernacle or the Temple decided to step out of their roles to do things their own way because someone else wasn't there to do the job. Do you suppose the Lord would have been pleased? Is it any different, then, in the church? Should a young, unmarried, no children man be consecrated as a bishop, for example, just because no man is present who qualifies?
All the women Paul mentioned by name in his epistles who he wrote labored with him in the Gospel: where are they in Acts, apart from a small reference to Priscilla? Lydia?
Where are the women who did "the same things" as Paul and his team of evangelists? Did Luke or Paul forget about them? Did they forget to mention how these women from the Epistles were there in the streets preaching and exhorting and testifying to the risen Messiah, with signs and wonders confirming the Word they shared?
I mean no offense to anyone, but I just don't see it. Rather, I see clear teaching in the Scriptures that cannot and has never been abrogated, and ought not to be tried, lest condemnation from God ensues.