If the early church was heavily influenced by Jewish thought, and in Judaism to ask God to "remember" is to ask that He make present once again that, which was in the past (ie to ask God to remember his mercy of old is to ask him to make that same mercy manifest in the present), then how could Luther and other reformers claim that the sacraments, long celebrated by the Great Church and never questioned even by the heretics of the first centuries of Christianity, were nothing but outward symbols of faith and not mysteries given to us by Christ so that He might continue to make Himself and His salvation manifest for us today...? If in Matthew 28 there is the explicit command to baptize, and in John 3, there is the explicit statement that one must be reborn of water and the spirit, how could the reformers deny that even the scriptures point to rites that bring about the grace they signify (and not by man... but by the power of God working in His People)?
2007-02-03
04:48:55
·
9 answers
·
asked by
Anonymous
in
Religion & Spirituality