You find a piece of paper....

[shazeep]

Originally Posted by Timmy

OK, let's forget about that specific example. Forget the healing or lack thereof. Forget about the piece of paper, for now. Let's go to the basic, simple question, as stated in my previous post:

Can you tell if a claimed message from God is really from God?

categorically, no. i might go as far as to say that i would consider any 'message from God' to be in error, unless it just basically reiterates some Scripture relevant to the moment. Don't know about anyone else, but i am generally struck, in these messages from God, by a sense of the receiver's self importance primarily? "i got something special/extraBiblical from God for you," like that. Been guilty of it myself. With the best of intentions, of course.

Scripture indicates to me that an extraBiblical message of this type should/would come with irrefutable proof attached; Abram struck dumb, etc.

so, yes, i can tell, because game recognize game...

[Timmy]

Originally Posted by shazeep

categorically, no. i might go as far as to say that i would consider any 'message from God' to be in error, unless it just basically reiterates some Scripture relevant to the moment. Don't know about anyone else, but i am generally struck, in these messages from God, by a sense of the receiver's self importance primarily? "i got something special/extraBiblical from God for you," like that. Been guilty of it myself. With the best of intentions, of course.

Scripture indicates to me that an extraBiblical message of this type should/would come with irrefutable proof attached; Abram struck dumb, etc.

so, yes, i can tell, because game recognize game...

The Bible is a purported message from God. And irrefutable proof of this kind of thing has likely never happened and probably never can. Being struck dumb is not irrefutable proof of anything.

Otherwise, good points. But, I don't get the "game recognize game" thing.

[Timmy]

Originally Posted by Timmy

. . . And irrefutable proof of this kind of thing has likely never happened and probably never can. . . .

The Bible illustrates this perfectly in the duel between Aaron and Pharaoh's magicians. A rod turning into a snake is not proof, because it wasn't amazing enough. The magicians could do that, too. Is Aaron's snake devouring the magicians' snakes amazing enough? To some it is, apparently.

But that puts the believers into a tough spot: are they simply to believe that every amazing thing, at least if it's really really amazing, is from God? But what if some of those false signs and wonders are really really amazing? They are told not to believe them, but they are not told how to recognize them.