I saw this on a Brother's wall, and found it deeply profound. As we all know, the origin of some articles and notes on social media are difficult to trace to the original author. This is valuable information, but at this time the author is unknown. The Goshen Gazette claims no right of authorship nor is there any intent of copyright infringement.
>>>Most Bibles have a page that says "New Testament" between Malachi and Matthew. Mine doesn't because I ripped it out because it's heresy!!! No where does the Bible itself call the books of Genesis to Malachi the "Old Testament". And nowhere does it call the books of Matthew to Revelation the "New Testament."
I think this is a big deal because it's a lie and it's messed up a lot of Christians. Any time believers dismiss stuff from the Hebrew Scriptures with the mantra "oh that's the Old Testament", you see that lie at work. It has contributed to replacement theology. It's one of the reasons the first four-fifths of many Bibles are collecting dust.
When people say and do stuff like this, it's because they've believed the lie of the "Old Testament". They don't realize that Genesis to Malachi is actually a series of covenants, i.e. testaments, all building on each other. They don't understand that according to Paul in Ephesians 2, they're members of at least one of them - he says non-Jewish believers have become members of the covenants of promise. Notice the plural there! They don't read these stories as their own stories - as the stories of the people they have been grafted into. They're just the *Old* Testament.
Calling the writings of Yeshua's apostles the "New Testament" is a lie, too. The new covenant, which was described in detail by the prophets of Israel and involves the Torah being written on your heart, isn't the books of Matthew to Revelation. The new covenant is a person! Isaiah 42:6 and 49:8 actually say that Yeshua IS the covenant. And he said the new covenant is in his blood which was shed for you and me.
As an aside if you're curious where these misleading terms came from, you can thank Marcion - who was kicked out of the church and branded a heretic in the mid-100s, but whose ghost lives on in pop theology today - for your Old and New Testament pages. You might have fun reading about him.
So what can we do about this? Well, for one thing, quit calling them the Old and New Testaments all the time. Learn to call the Old Testament the Hebrew Scriptures, or the Tanach as they're called by the Jewish people. You could also call the New Testament the Apostolic Writings, or something similar. You could also go a little crazy like me and tear those two pages out of your Bible. Symbolically, of course. And, most importantly, you can help correct people's misunderstandings on the issue. Because those two pages aren't really the problem, they're a symptom of something deeper. And now you know the rest of the story.......
I think this is a big deal because it's a lie and it's messed up a lot of Christians. Any time believers dismiss stuff from the Hebrew Scriptures with the mantra "oh that's the Old Testament", you see that lie at work. It has contributed to replacement theology. It's one of the reasons the first four-fifths of many Bibles are collecting dust.
When people say and do stuff like this, it's because they've believed the lie of the "Old Testament". They don't realize that Genesis to Malachi is actually a series of covenants, i.e. testaments, all building on each other. They don't understand that according to Paul in Ephesians 2, they're members of at least one of them - he says non-Jewish believers have become members of the covenants of promise. Notice the plural there! They don't read these stories as their own stories - as the stories of the people they have been grafted into. They're just the *Old* Testament.
Calling the writings of Yeshua's apostles the "New Testament" is a lie, too. The new covenant, which was described in detail by the prophets of Israel and involves the Torah being written on your heart, isn't the books of Matthew to Revelation. The new covenant is a person! Isaiah 42:6 and 49:8 actually say that Yeshua IS the covenant. And he said the new covenant is in his blood which was shed for you and me.
As an aside if you're curious where these misleading terms came from, you can thank Marcion - who was kicked out of the church and branded a heretic in the mid-100s, but whose ghost lives on in pop theology today - for your Old and New Testament pages. You might have fun reading about him.
So what can we do about this? Well, for one thing, quit calling them the Old and New Testaments all the time. Learn to call the Old Testament the Hebrew Scriptures, or the Tanach as they're called by the Jewish people. You could also call the New Testament the Apostolic Writings, or something similar. You could also go a little crazy like me and tear those two pages out of your Bible. Symbolically, of course. And, most importantly, you can help correct people's misunderstandings on the issue. Because those two pages aren't really the problem, they're a symptom of something deeper. And now you know the rest of the story.......
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