I received a booklet from a Bible Presbyterian pastor friend few years ago, he is a very special Christian to me, why he is, because he is different from other BP pastor. He has a widen view regarding Christianity.
In his small booklet given to me, it is written, "...in the church, some of them say baptism by immersion is good, some of them say baptism by sprinkling is good, some of them say head covering is good, every man with different understanding, so do not be proud, do not be the king, do not impose by force these things onto others....Love must be better, heart opened wide, if I do not eat meat, I cannot forced other to refrain from meat. Presently, many churches are separated, self developing, taking care of their own banner, or some of them say we must immerse into water three times, some of them say we immerse once is enough, some of them say immerse vertically, some of them say immerse with a kneeling position, all of these are not important. Because the Bible is not written in detail regarding the mode of the baptism. If the mode of baptism is effecting our salvation, the Bible will surely written more detail regarding them, so that we may obey them, in order we may not fallen away. But Bible has different dealings with Holy Communion, Bible reading, prayers, they are recorded in detail, these are very important, they are the prominent truths. There are people who are proud, they look down on others, despise other denominations, this is because their narrowness, shallow viewed. The Bible tell us, 2 Peter 1:7, "And to godliness brotherly kindness; and to brotherly kindness charity...." End of that paragraph in the Booklet....
Why I bring up the mode of baptism here?
Like the mode of baptism, I hope we learned that Verbal Plenary Preservation is a personal conviction, a personal preference, a personal view, it does not effect our salvation, as far as we accepting both KJV as the English Bible, and CUV the Chinese Bible, since every faithful translation is accepting Christ as the only way of salvation, preaching the same old Gospel, Christ dies for us, and after the salvation, good works. These are the more prominent truth we must cling on! So these faithful Bible translations also including some Bible translations like NKJV, NIV, ESV. Are those prominent doctrine I mentioned missing from these Bible translations like the NKJV? Obviously, no. That is why we still accepting NKJV for a readable version.
The preservation of the Bible is not recorded in detail, some say the Bible preserved in jot and title, some say this "jot and title" means every Old Testament law and requirement are completed by Christ, some of them say this mean we must print "a perfect Bible." With many different view regarding Bible preservation, this is like the differences in the mode of baptism and head covering. We do believe Bible is preserved by God, but we must not impose those personal view on others!
The Bible is the sword of the Holy Spirit! Do not put in this way, the Holy Spirit is the sword of the Bible!
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