Sunday School - Teaching On Baptism (Cessationism) - Part 5

Silicon Valley Reformed Baptist Church

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Sunday School - Teaching On Baptism (Cessationism) - Part 6

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I was chatting with Tim, so it's his fault that I don't have a pen ready. We're going to continue with Cessation.

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Do keep in mind as we go through this today that we're following Sam Waldron's book to be continued.

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I try to give attribution to him. Remember that?

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I just want to remind you. We're running to this Philip the Evangelist. Speaking of Philip, it says,

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He had four unmarried daughters who prophesied for us. Can we then understand prophecy in the

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New Testament being fundamentally the same as the Old Testament? Can we see that there were prophets named as such?

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Can we take them as such? Not just that they're prophesied for women. They were prophets in the traditional sense.

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Calvin does a really good job of explaining this. I'm not going to chat in that verse. I'm going to read this little bit of a long quote that appeared lately.

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Calvin says, This is added for the commendation of Philip. Not only that we might think that his house was well ordered, but also that it was famous and excellent through the blessing of God.

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For assuredly it was no small gift to have four daughters all endowed with the spirit of prophecy. By this means, for it was meant to beautify the first beginnings of the gospel when he raised up men and women to foretell the days to come.

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Excuse me. Prophecies had now almost ceased many years among the Jews, to the end that they might be more attentive and desirous to hear the new voice of the gospel.

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Therefore, seeing the prophesy which was in a manner quite ceased, now after a long time returning again, it was a token of the moral of the state.

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Notwithstanding, it seems that the same it seems that the same was the reason why it ceased shortly after, for God did support the old people with the first foretellings until Christ should make an end of all prophecies.

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What's he saying there? What's what Waldron said? What's happened due to this prophecy?

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It's fundamentally the same prophecy comes in the same way the life of the spirit of God speaking to a person mostly men but sometimes women as in this case and the purpose of the prophecy is what we can assess especially in the

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New Testament the Old Testament and the New Testament What would you say is the purpose of prophecy in this context?

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It sounds like it was to establish the fact that this was God's work. Establish that it was God's work?

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In an apostolic sense? Speaking of the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus Christ and prophecy more particularly to complete the canon

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God speaking through this human to bring the canon to bring the scripture to a close and we don't have any reward for these four prophecies that are in those letters so all we know is that they were prophesied in the traditional sense we have other prophets in the

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Old Testament we don't know what they said some we call prophets we have some like Elijah and Elisha obviously they were prophets but we have nothing they didn't write anything so this is from someone else so it's a bit of a mish -bag we don't have to worry about the fact that these prophetesses have nothing, we don't know what they said nothing recorded the

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Apostles were texting until the end of the scripture that was the purpose to bring forth the end of the scripture there were prophetesses in the

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Old Testament to make this clear some of whom we had their words recorded, others not in Exodus 15, 20 and 21 this is right after the

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Red Sea the sea closed in on the Egyptians and Moses says you know these

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Egyptians you see, you're never going to see again that great victory that the Lord in Exodus 15 the men sing this song of praise to God for what

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He's done and the women answer it says there specifically, Miriam Moses' sister, she's called a prophetess she's a prophetess as she leads the women in a song of Thanksgiving after the

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Red Sea crossing she's a prophetess in the sense of giving the word of God but also her words were recorded to release her from the spirit of God through her in praise in Joseph 4 verse 4,

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Deborah is named both judge and prophetess in 2 Kings 22 same as 2

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Chronicles 34 Huldah the prophetess she actually speaks for God and makes prophecy in the traditional sense 2

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Kings 22 16 thus says the Lord behold

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I will bring disaster upon this place and upon its inhabitants all the words of the book that the king of Judah has read that was in Josiah's time remember the book of the law was found and Josiah heard and read that he tore his robes and repented in sackcloth and ashes because now he understood why we're in such bad shape before God had been hidden away for a long time

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I told you about how Huldah was this prophetess and she spoke for the Lord, directed for God prophecies in the traditional futuristic sense ok so what do we conclude here that a prophecy in every sense of the word continued throughout the entire development of scripture from Genesis to Revelation now prophecies predominantly but far from exclusively the realm of men ok and regarding apostasy, any questions?

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we're tracking along with this ok regarding apostasy was that office limited to only the twelve as named in Matthew 10

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Mark 3, 13, 19 and Luke 6, 12, 15 now those three gospels in those passages

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I just read out that's where Jesus in Luke prays all night and the other ones obviously pray all night but they don't say that specifically that's when in the morning he names the twelve disciples as apostates the same twelve disciples were following now named specifically apostates ok so was it limited only to them return if you will to follow along now in these scriptures

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Acts 14, 14 whoever gets there first just read it out if you don't know who's first go ahead read it out

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Acts 14, 14 but when the apostles

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Barnabas and Paul heard of it, they tore their garments and rushed out into the crowd crying out thank you did

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Barnabas ever name amongst the disciples this was saying that we know

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Luke is an inspired author, inspired by the spirit of God who was the savior of the apostles Barnabas and Paul so what do we make concluded about Barnabas he's an apostle but he's not one of the twelve he's not even one who was born out of due time he's an apostle turn to 1

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Corinthians 9 5 and 6 do we not have the right to take along a believing wife as do the other apostles and brothers of the

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Lord and Cephas or is it only Barnabas and I who have no right to refrain from working for a living so again other apostles now other apostles can mean

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Paul speaking of himself and then he's saying what about those other twelve and they're the only ones that could mean that and the brothers of the

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Lord what are the names of the brothers of the Lord I know that there was

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Jude I know that there was James let's just stop at those two to know those for sure

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Mary's son the other apostles and the brothers of the

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Lord are they being included in this title of apostles they're apostles again we have this distinction we're not calling them capital

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A apostles or names specifically personally by Jesus Christ small apostles but they are apostles so the brothers of the

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Lord and Cephas, Cephas is Peter who's one of the capital A apostles so other apostles and brothers of the

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Lord and Cephas he has them all together under this one rubric Paul's including them as administering the same office as himself the brothers of the

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Lord were named by Jesus as apostles in the Gospels in fact in John 7 when we read about the brothers of the

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Lord he says even his own brothers did not believe him so it wasn't until after his resurrection when

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James the author of the book of James or Jude or his other brothers came to believe him while he lived and Paul says by the spirit of God writing the inspired scripture they were apostles 1

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Corinthians 12 29 Are all apostles, are all prophets, are all teachers, do all work miracles?

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That implies that some in the church could have been or maybe even were apostles and or prophets he's speaking of Corinthians church he's talking about his distribution of gifts and his question is are all of you apostles?

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What does that imply? The answer would be no we're not all apostles but clearly in the question implies some of you not only could be but you are and the same with the other offices are all apostles, are all prophets, are all teachers do all work miracles

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Galatians 1 19 somebody need to read that out for us

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Galatians 1 19 But I did not see any of the apostles except James Okay right

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James the Lord's brother not named by Jesus as an apostle but under inspiration

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Paul writing Galatians the book of Galatians to the Galatians he's speaking of James the

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Lord's brother as an apostle Ephesians 2 19 and 20 also bears on this

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So then there you are no longer strangers and aliens but you are fellow citizens of the saints and members of the household of God built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets

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Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone Now this is a really interesting verse and this is why we at the beginning pointed out that the apostles were prophets, not all prophets were apostles but all prophets were not all prophets were apostles but all the apostles were prophets

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Okay This is a really strong proof that apostleship and prophethood were the same

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In the Greek the phrase apostles and prophets describe the same person, one and the same person.

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Have you ever heard of Granville Sharpe? Raise your hand if you know Granville Sharpe It's turned out not to be a perfect rule but it's a really really good rule that if you have a certain phrase that has let me think how much detail

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I want to go into I don't want to go into a lot of detail when you have apostles and prophets in the

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Greek form that we find that short phrase the apostles and the prophets it refers to one and the same person.

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It's like our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ is in that Greek form, the form that's nouns and verbs and the connecting, the kai, it's all the same and that means that Lord and Savior is one and the same person, our great

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God and Savior Jesus Christ, again the same idea if we have one person, not God and Jesus is separate

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I'll speak of them, speak of those two as one, great God and Savior Jesus Christ, one and the same person.

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Same here that the apostles and prophets in this phraseology very clearly distinctly means the apostles and the prophets are the one person to appear as the apostle and prophet

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Paul, apostle and prophet Matthew, apostle and prophet and finally

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Ephesians 4 .11 somebody else read that out for us if you would please and he gave the apostles, the prophets the evangelists, the shepherds and the teachers now this verse has to do with this idea that we have the small apostles in the church, we have prophets we have evangelists, we have shepherds, we have teachers they're all these things in the church not everybody is them, but some can be but it's a completed act in the church again without going into detail in the

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Greek he's speaking of something that Christ did, accomplished, not an ongoing thing, he did this in the church he gave these gifts to the church so the apostolic office extended beyond the twelve the twelve still hold this special position but their office and their function in testifying about Jesus' death and resurrection as eyewitnesses is what set them apart from the small apostles small apostles apostles in the traditional sense with this important exception

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Jesus named the twelve and the twelve were eyewitnesses to his life, they were eyewitnesses to his teaching, eyewitnesses to his miracles, and most importantly eyewitnesses to what?

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his resurrection is Paul an eyewitness to the resurrection?

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is he? hmm be a little careful, I'm picking bits here he's an eyewitness to the resurrected

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Lord, and by that he can testify to the resurrection you know right when

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I said that I had that in my notes I said that this is true of all of us I mean nobody actually saw

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Jesus come up out of the grave or out of the small let me take that one back well there can be a distinction if you're trying to make people who saw him alive pre -crucifixion and post -crucifixion like they didn't see a difference in his regular glory of my body so Paul does, you know, he is separate in that way thank you um so again this small name, caper name, apostleship

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I just want to make sure that we understand that the function is the same but the twelve are still set apart and we get that in Revelation 21 -14 speaking of the new

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Jerusalem and all the city had twelve foundations and on them were the twelve names of the twelve apostles of the land who is this?

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this is the twelve apostles Waldron page 24 says we must make a distinction in the new testament between those who were apostles of Christ, big

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A apostles, and those who were simply apostles of the churches, small a apostles, and again um, confirmed in Acts 13, 1 -3 small a, big a distinction now there were in the church and anti -prophets and teachers

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Barnabas, Simeon, who was called Niger, Lucius of Cyrene Manion, a lifelong a lifelong friend of Herod the tetrarch and Saul, while they were worshiping the

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Lord and fasting, the Holy Spirit said set apart for me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them for the work to which

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I have called them then after fasting and praying he laid hands on them and sent them off so Paul, remember, considered

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Barnabas to be an apostle and there were at that time apostles in the church outside of the twelve, really important for us to understand it was important for me to pick that up so I thank you for the question apostleship, prophethood continued throughout so it was throughout the establishment of the church and the finalization of the scripture not limited to the twelve nor to men alone either in Old Testament or New Testament times so what does all this tell us

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I really appreciate the question this helps us along this idea of continuationism versus cessationism against Pentecostalism against the charismatic movement against the third wave movement the miraculous gifts of the apostles were for them at that time and some of the modern third wave movement will go so far as to say that preaching not attended with signs and wonders that's why what those signs and wonders would be what they call power preaching is not preaching at all again

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I don't know what they mean by signs and wonders in the preaching maybe the

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Holy Spirit would smack you in the head and you have that Holy Spirit rolling on the floor type of thing that they were doing

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John Packard got caught up in that did I tell you guys that he was here we used to host the

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Whitfield Fraternity it was a meeting of reformed pastors Robert Godfrey men of that caliber and John Packard was here and it was several years after he came out of that vineyard charismatic third wave kind of movement they talked about how people were barking like dogs and rolling on the floor things like that that's a bit of an excursion, excuse me for that but the third wave movement would say that if you preach it's not coincident with signs and wonders it's not preaching at all what's the church you're reading?

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Bethel Bethel church you're reading how many know about that church ok everybody with the glitter that comes down that's the sign of wonder kind of thing trying to contrive to show that the preaching has power they take it very very far so our question is do miraculous gifts should we seek it out as normative so Waldron says on page 42 miraculous gifts when some measure connected with the presence of the living apostles in the church so what was this for the gifts certified what so we see these gifts of the

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Holy Spirit coming upon people they certify the presence of the Holy Spirit in power bringing salvation to those who heard the gospel preached the manifestation especially by tongues of the spiritual what was that a sign for not a rhetorical question

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I want to hear your thoughts when you read through Acts Peter or Paul are preaching and the people they preach to they say the spirit fell on them in Acts chapter 8 when the spirit fell on the

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Samaritans when Peter and John went out and they saw the

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Holy Spirit but we don't even know what they saw we don't know what it was that made them sure that the spirit had fallen on them other places in Acts when they preach the people they preach to speak in tongues what do you think the tongues were about in those cases apostle preaches the spirit is converting them they speak in tongues what's that about was it just to show that something new was happening something new was happening ok good this is not normative even in the book of Acts it's not even normative

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I think it's more on the explanation of the preaching for their own language for their own dialect ok their own dialect that's

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Acts chapter 2 we're going to talk about that in a little bit if they had the gift of tongues they can preach the gospel to other people around in other areas ok those are all good answers tongues as a special gift of the

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Holy Spirit this is a biblical excursus for us I want you to understand this they first appear in Acts chapter 2 when

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Peter is preaching we're all familiar with that tongues as a fire fell upon the apostles and they spoke in tongues that's the first place it would happen now this was inexplicable they were there for the

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Passover festival they have all these Jews coming by they're going to the temple for the finalization of the festival or perhaps on their way home not exactly sure it's those guys who were there for that tongues as a flame fell upon the apostles and they started preaching it was inexplicable they didn't understand what was happening it was only by mutual consultation that they found out what was happening now

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I have to admit I have an opinion that is not 100 % known by every commentator or scholar but it's widely known

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I'm not charting, I'm being grounded ok the explanation of the tongues is found in Acts chapter 2 sorry for all the flipping

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Acts chapter 2 verse 7 and they, that's the men who stopped because of what the spirit was doing, they were amazed and astonished saying are not all these men who are speaking

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Galileans? they knew the accent, what language do you think they were speaking? they heard the accent they're

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Galileans what language did they speak? did anybody know? what? that's close more specifically though Aramaic the apostles were speaking

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Aramaic that's the language Peter knew, that's the language Matthew knew, all those guys Judas, Nabal, Nebuchadnezzar they knew

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Aramaic and they heard it they say I don't understand the accent they're Galileans we know because of their accent do you know another place this came up?

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when Peter was outside while Jesus was being tried by the high priest they said but you're a

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Galilean because your accent betrays you okay I think they're speaking

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Aramaic the language that they know the miracle of the tongues is that we heard, this is what the people who heard, the people who were there who were gaining the benefit of this miracle of the spirit they say we're hearing it in our tongues they're

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Galileans, we can hear their accent but I'm understanding it as a Mede, as a person

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Parthians, Medes Elamites and residents of Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia Confucius in Asia, Phrygia and Camphylia, Egypt and the parts of Libya belonging to Cyrene and visitors from Rome the miracle is not that I'm speaking

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Latin or Mesopotamian to you, the miracle is you're hearing it thinking in terms of Biblical theology what is happening here

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Christ has been raised up the apostles have come together they've replaced Judas who had handed himself over they're praying they're waiting to see what's going to happen next and here this happens preaching the gospel preaching about Jesus we're hearing it in our lives, what's really happening here thinking in terms of Biblical theology

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Emmanuel Is Biblical prophecy being fulfilled? Prophecy fulfilled, okay do you have a specific one in mind?

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Joel Joel, okay, you're in Joel chapter 2 can you quote it without turning there?

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can you tell us what it says there? well, yes okay

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I'll start in oh, let me back up one page okay verse 16 by but this is what but this is that which was spoken by the prophet

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Joel and it shall come to pass in the last days saith

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God I will pour out my spirit upon all flesh and your and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy and your young men shall see visions and your old men shall dream dreams he goes on to the rest of Joel's prophecy and he says and I will show wonders in the heavens above signs of the earth below, blood and fire vapor and smoke and all that is what's happening so it's the completion, it's the fulfillment of Joel's prophecy so he didn't say that it happened to them, that's

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Joel's prophecy, it doesn't go on and on and on he says what you're seeing is what

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Joel prophesied okay as well as that I think this is where the biblical theology that we really need to focus on here is the reversal of Babel remember

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Babel and then built a tower to go to God and God says we all speak the same language and because they speak the same language nothing is going to be restricted from them and look what they're doing with this unity that they have, they're trying to be like God it's one of the darkest chapters in the

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Bible and so he gives them all different languages what happens when

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Peter speaks the gospel the resurrected word of Jesus Christ he speaks in pure Hebrew which is the reversal of Babel is the reunifying of people in Christ is the reversal of that curse that's what's happening in Acts 2 and that's what the tongues were about I'm speaking,

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I'm speaking Galilean, I'm speaking Aramaic with my Galilean accent I just made my reservations for a fire conference in May I know the person

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I'm speaking to is speaking English with that Mississippi accent I had to ask her to repeat myself five times that's not what's happening here they're hearing the language they understand the accent but it's coming to them in their own language they understood fairly important here that the languages were understood it wasn't just Babel now after that tongues don't appear again until Acts chapter 10 and what happens in Acts chapter 10 is when

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Peter goes to Cornelius' household remember he has that vision that three times with that blanket laid down with all the food on it and all the animals on it kill and eat don't call unclean what

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I've cleaned what I call clean and so Peter understood from this he needs to go to the

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Gentiles the Gentiles are cleansed with the same blood as the Jews he goes to Cornelius' household

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Cornelius obviously a Gentile and he tells them the gospel and then the spirit falls upon them and they're speaking in tongues

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I wanted to go to Acts chapter 8 before I did that I gave myself a note before you do that in Acts chapter 8 I didn't in Acts chapter 8 there's a gospel on a filthy evangelist that preached in Samaritan to the perversion of many the

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Jewish apostles couldn't really believe the Samaritans could believe the gospel that God would convert someone to the low down type or the latter as a

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Samaritan that problem that they had with them so they sent Peter and John to check it out when they saw and then prayed with them they saw the

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Holy Spirit fall on them just as he had upon them the apostles it doesn't say it was tongues that they saw but it was some manifestation of the spirit that they could see or hear and somehow recognize tongues is not certain in Acts chapter 8 in Samaritan but it's a good candidate for what they heard but then

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I'm going to use this household and a spoken tongue

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I've already spoken about that Peter preaches they hear the gospel, they're converted by the spirit they speak in tongues now what's happening here?

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what are the tongues about there? in Acts chapter 2 you have that one case where I'm speaking my language but you're hearing your native language re -unifying that curse is reversed here's

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Peter's explanation of his experience according to his household Acts chapter 11 beginning verse 15 as I began to speak the

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Holy Spirit fell on them just as on us at the beginning that's

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Acts chapter 2 tongues as a flame not exactly the same but falling upon them and I remember the word of the

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Lord how he said John baptized with water but you will be baptized with the

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Holy Spirit if then God gave the same gift to them as he gave to us when we believed in the

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Lord Jesus Christ who was I that I could stand in God's way so even on the

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Gentiles that's chapter 10 chapter 10 verse 45 implying that the gift seen there according to his household was the same as they had seen among the

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Jews he was seeing the gift that the apostle understood that the

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Gentiles were in the kingdom so what were the tongues about according to his household what was the importance of the tongues in chapter 10 according to his household what was that importance what was the importance of it what did

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Peter say the gospel of the

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Gentiles who was it assigned to was it assigned to Cornelius that he was saved it was assigned to Jews it was assigned to Jews it was assigned to Peter it was assigned to the apostle it was assigned to the preacher that's really important if people just started talking in tongues so that they would know that they were saved

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I don't even know if they knew what they were doing it's a whole other story when I can go into that excursus but Peter himself says when

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I saw this I knew that they were saved the same way we were saved it was assigned to the apostles that they were saved this happens again in tongues as a miraculous gift of the spirit as much as they get attention today they don't get a lot of attention it doesn't happen that often they are important but not that common

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Acts chapter 19 this is Paul and it happened that while Apollos was at Corinth Paul passed through the inland country and came to Ephesus there he found some disciples and he said to them did you receive the

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Holy Spirit when you believed and they said no we have not even heard that there is a Holy Spirit and he said into what then were you baptized they said into John's baptism and Paul said

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John baptized with baptism of repentance telling people to believe in the one who is to come after him that is

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Jesus hearing this they were baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus and when

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Paul had laid his hands on them the Holy Spirit came on them and they began speaking in tongues and prophesying there were about 12 in all so it was for Paul to know that these had been converted and brought to the

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Lord Jesus Christ and their understanding was not complete they believed only in John's baptism of repentance they didn't understand that repentance was accomplished because of Jesus that there's repentance was useful because of Jesus Christ and his death and resurrection they understood that they had the gospel they were speaking in tongues that was a sign to Paul that these men were actually converted it reminds me too of King Saul's conversion back in 1st

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Samuel chapter 7 Samuel says after that you shall come to Gibeah the

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Elohim where there is a garrison of the Philistines and there as soon as you come to see you will meet a group of prophets coming down from a high place with harps and flute and lyre before them prophesying then the

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Spirit of the Lord will worship upon you and you will prophesy with them and be turned into another man but all who knew him previously saw how he prophesied with the prophets the people said to one another what has come over the son of Kish is

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Saul also one of the prophets it was a sign of the sign of the holder it was a sign of the hand of the holder not so much of the one speaking about the sign bearer so much as the one who sees it and is certified in the honor that God had done for him any questions about that?

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they were very attractive with me, are there any objections to what I'm saying? I remember hearing a sermon that the pastor was saying that he used the word conversion because he held the opposite view

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I think there's a terminology called a common operation of the Spirit on an unconverted person

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I'm borrowing a little bit from Conley but I think what the pastor another pastor was saying he didn't think that Saul was saved he didn't think what?

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he didn't think that Saul was saved oh, Saul King Saul? yeah,

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I would agree I was just using him as an example that the manifestation of the

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Spirit at that moment in the Old Testament was at that moment was a sign of the holder that's all

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I was saying that's all I was saying thank you okay okay, now

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I need a little disclaimer here that we have not dealt with 1 Corinthians 12 -14 that whole thing about ordering the church and when you speak in a tongue you need an interpreter and prophesy and all that stuff and there's some reasons

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I haven't and one reason to be really honest with you is I have a hard time figuring it out the other reason is that things going on in the

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Corinthian church were very unique to the world Paul speaks about they do things as in all the other churches so we had rules throughout all churches of Christ, even at that time um the

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Corinthian issues would just drive us into a long rabbit trail against where we really want to go and honestly

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I do have a hard time figuring out how much of that was just at Corinth how much of that Paul did not do in the other churches how much should be in their church today it can get very confusing um tongues do seem to be prevalent in that church at Corinth Paul does insist upon interpreters that's 1

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Corinthians 14 6 -13 and he doesn't correct does not correct the use of tongues there only that they use them rightly which means for mutual edification of the church none of which it compels us to extend tongues beyond the apostolic age so the

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Corinthian tongues could have been especially persuasive when the spirit of God was in the church and not the nearby highly varied and numerous pagan cults that could have been one of the reasons there that God used a special manifestation of the spirit so for our idea of cessationism versus continuationism dependence on tongues falters on the biblical evidence that tongues were assigned to the preacher and in the cases that we have them showing up the preacher was an

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Apostle, capital A capital A Apostles Peter and Paul those are the only two we have and both of them say it was assigned to me that the spirit of God had fallen so for Paul that he had completed that God had completed the conversion of John the

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Baptist to Cyclus that was in Ephesus actually in 18 for Peter that the gospel went out equally on the same basis to the

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Gentiles as to himself so when he was at his household school in Thomas Peter knew that they were sick when

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Peter and John went to Samaria believing who? anything good come out of Samaria well they wouldn't believe that in chapter 4 of John Jews and Samaritans had nothing to do with each other the

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Holy Spirit fell on them the Samaritans and it was assigned to Peter and John Apostles, capital

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A Apostles assigned to them that God had done the same thing to the Samaritans the same thing happens with the

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Gentile nation via Cornelius Acts chapter 10 so in answer to Charles' question the other

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Apostles there were other Apostles I thank you for asking the question last week there were other

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Apostles there were prophets but we have Biblical evidence as we've gone through that the manifestations of the

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Spirit in the special ways of the Greek Acts were to the Apostles that they know for sure that the

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Church was expanding into those places and that gives us a very good

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Biblical basis to say that the Gentile, the Samaritans had to go out that's the world and now that it's gone out now that it's been certified now that those preachers, capital

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A Apostles know that the preaching of the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ is the catalyst of conversion as proven then by what they saw we can say it's in because that foundation has been laid that's

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Ephesians 2 laying on the foundation of the prophets and the Apostles that's for one

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Apostle, remember that we speak of the same person not a single person

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Apostle, prophet as a single Apostle so that gives us that foundation, that reason for saying we have the faith once for all to the group of saints as Jude who was also an

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Apostle saw him, says in the prophet writing in Scripture he gives us a foundation to say we don't have those miraculous signs those manifestations of the

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Spirit as they were 2 ,000 years ago why? so we have an answer to that, why don't we have them in a practical way?

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Biblically I could talk about who they were for and what they established then why don't we put them today in a church sense the foundation has been laid we have the

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Scripture, we have the record of Jesus' death burial, his resurrection we have the prophets of the

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Old Testament pointing towards Jesus Christ we have prophets in the New Testament saying yes

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Jesus is the one, this is fulfilled we have the Scripture we have the

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Holy Spirit bringing us conversion giving us strength, giving us power to be Israel why?

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we have the foundation and we live and exist and worship on that foundation after it's been established any other comments or questions now?

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I'm just curious to know it's just my own understanding

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I'm not a pictorial actually but from the words so the

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Scripture alone we have the record of Jesus Christ and the rule of the church as to any reformers who were continuationists is kind of what you're asking

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I couldn't answer that off the top of my head and honestly I'm not going to I can't go through all of them and pick it out my answer, my guess would be no if there was a reformer in the sense that you're asking who was a continuationist he's got to be the odd duck he can't have been many because they were so focused on Sola Scripture that we have the

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Scripture once the Pope delivered the saints and a lot of their polemic was against Catholicism where the

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Pope could in rare instances but the Pope could speak out Scripture because he was the figure of Christ he could speak directly for God on his own authority and so Sola Scripture was very important to the reformers and we have 66 books, this is the final book if there were continuationists you'd have to ask somebody who's much more read than I am my guess would be no well, so far the the definition of cessationism that you provided in the examples that I can agree with but I've noticed there's different iterations of cessationism that I've heard from one from one minister across the pond where he was asked, so do you believe do you believe you can cast out demons in the name of Jesus?

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and he says no because those are apostolic sign gifts those are what?

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because his reasoning was those were apostolic sign gifts oh apostolic, ok and then but then like but in the book of James because I think the common understanding is the book of Acts is descriptive the epistles are prescriptive well, what about in the book of James where it talks about if somebody's sick bring the elders to the church and anoint them with oil

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I see that more with the charismatic realm, but not so much in the reform realm I guess in your experience, did you see any reform pastors visiting people when they're sick and praying over them with olive oil what's your take on that?

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I've never anointed someone but I know pastors in our theological realm, good friends of mine who have, on the basis of exactly what you're saying in James I said last night when

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I started this and to your question believing that certain miraculous things have ceased does not mean that we as believers in the reform tradition don't believe in miracles

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I believe in miracles, ok I believe that the Holy Spirit is working today

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I believe that he's manifesting himself amongst the people I don't believe he's doing it this way

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I don't believe, I have to hear somebody speaking in tongues to say ok, he's got his second blessing and he's now moving up the ladder, that's not how they describe it,

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I can't get into that myself it seems like you have first or second class christians in that way but remember that believing that these signed gifts, these miraculous gifts described in Acts have ended 1

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Corinthians 12 and 14, we did that part believing that those have ceased and there are no apostles to have layers smaller than that and the prophecy has ceased believing these things does not mean that we have this dead kind of boring faith

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I believe God is working I believe God is working through us I believe God is working through preaching

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I believe God is working through building his church through our efforts I believe he does miracles we have great faithful in this church even unbelievers my nieces she was still going years ago my nieces husband had blasphemy was that the name of it?

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it was a terrible attack on him very aggressive went to Stanford saw the meeting expert he said get your affairs together take a vacation, go out with the family nothing to do with this pray pray pray for his healing conversion he was healed and one of those things that goes back to Stanford he was healed

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I believe that God answered our purposes so the fact that we don't believe that Thomas and his other things have continued in the church here, does not mean that we have this dead part of faith and we don't believe

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God is working amongst us God is working and he does answer the prayer we've seen it in many of the incidents so kind of a long answer for answering this question but I know the question was, are the people sick in James talk about sick with sin and they need to understand that if they confess that they're forgiven true or is it that people are physically sick