Iano writes:
If the inspiration is from God then wouldn't all the conclusions drawn by the inspired whilst under inspiration conform to God's view? For example:
quote:
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Acts 18:9 One night the Lord spoke to Paul in a vision: Do not be afraid; keep on speaking, do not be silent. 10 For I am with you, and no one is going to attack and harm you, because I have many people in this city. 11 So Paul stayed in Corinth for a year and a half, teaching them the word of God.
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What practical difference God's view issued by dictation or inspiration?
We would agree that Paul was inspired by God to continue teaching in Corinth. It doesn't follow at all, unless one decides to impose their own view on what is written, that Paul would just be a conduit for God to speak through without involving Paul's own thoughts. It just means that Paul was gifted, and inspired, to preach to the Corinthians and as Paul would agree, to do so in spite of his human failings.
For example: Thirty years ago I believe I was led into a ministry of leading sing-alongs with seniors. I have been doing it ever since but as anyone who has heard me can well attest I don't do it perfectly.
I believe that the Biblical authors, were inspired to write down their experiences of God and that now we in turn are to allow ourselves to be inspired by what they wrote. We are to be inspired to reflect God's love and righteousness to the world, we are to learn from the mistakes that have been made by the various authors and the people they wrote about, we are to be led in all truth by God's Holy Spirit and the Bible is one of the gifts given us by God to do that. Will we do it perfectly? Not by a long shot.
I have been going through the book of Joshua. It is a blood curdling story about Joshua going from one town to another killing everyone in sight declaring that God is delivering them into their hands. Does that idea bear any resemblance whatsoever to what Jesus taught? We are to look at the story of Jonah and be inspired to sort out how he went so wrong and to draw parallels in our own lives, both as individuals and as societies so that we don't make the same mistakes.
I contend that if we try to turn the Bible into one long book of rules and other absolutes we are missing out on so much of what God wants to teach us. As I have said before, I don’t believe that the Bible is the 4th member of the Trinity. God has created us with free will and to treat the Bible as a book that would have us follow without question a set of laws negates our ability to follow God, as seen through the lens of the resurrected Jesus who we are told is the word of God. We are to follow out of love not fear.
The Bible chronicles the history and stories of God’s people. When looked at from a distance it tells the meta-narrative from creation to new creation and calls us to see where and how we fit into that story.
Edited by GDR, : typo
Everybody is entitled to my opinion.