History of rings

[The Lemon]

Wheww, I have read this entire thread and my head hurts! It seems to me that there is a patten in religious pratices that closely resembles the pattern that most successful companies use..SALES. Everything revolves around sales, everyone is selling something or some idea - and as it usually goes..my product is better then my competitions..LOL.

Seriously, the issue with subjects like this (as well as the plethora of other threads about "standards") is that it seems that there is a great deal of respect and tolerance that those of a more "Liberal" stance have towards the more conservative folks (Of course not everyone, there have been some rude mods and libs!)

On the other hand it seems quite unbalanced the other way around. What i find is that exerpts like this one by Chalfant aqre usually used as a springboard to try and persuade the more liberal that there thinking is wrong and needs to change to this more "biblical" way of holiness, and any argument made in the contrary is met with alot of comments that alude to the fact that the liberal person is compromising, reading into the Bible what they want etc., and these comments come from the fact that the liberal person is just not buying what the more conservative person is selling.. so the tantrum begins.

Nothing wrong with critically examining, questioning, and reasoning together, the problem always comes down to mutual respect for each others convictions, not matter how strict they are. It amazes me the folks that I still know who will say they respect a brother or sister who holds a less strict stance on something like rings, but if that person with the ring was asked to preach they would dismiss alot of what He/She said soley on the basis that the person wears a ring so they must be missing God somehow..good grief!