To The Reader:
For the past ten years I have been writing a book about my thoughts on the beauty and
simplicity of primitive Christianity. "Primitive Christians".
That is what
caught my initial attention back in the summer of 1968 about the name of the religion my grandfather
Luther Van Clay belonged to,
when I looked it up in the set of encyclopedias at our home at the time in Bitburg,
Germany. The following year I also became a member of that same primitive
Christian congregation. My grandfather was a faithful primitive Christian up until
the day of his death on May 19, 2007 at the young age of 96. I will look forward to
seeing him again in the flesh when Christ resurrects him during his thousand year rule
over a paradise earth.
Talking to people about the Bible for four decades has made me realize that:
"the
corruption of Christianity came not so much from what was taken away from it but what was added
to it". I have done research and could find no author making that
exact statement, so, I claim authorship to it. Why?
Here's an example. I love to explain to people about the role Jesus plays as the Christ.
However traditional Christians are generally not at all interested. They say they already
believe that, and that they are "saved". However, they cannot fully
appreciate and understand that Jesus is the Messiah. Why not? Because the
Trinity doctrine was added, and this alone would void the concept of Jesus being the
Christ.
Oh, the beauty of the unique Christian hope of the resurrection, the dead will
return to life! However, again, traditional Christians are uninterested. They already
believe it, so they say. But, who really needs the resurrection if we all possess an
immortality soul? Would a future resurrection serve any purpose?
I have found people who have read the Bible through many times and
they truly believe everything, every single word it says. However they fail to understand
and appreciate even basic Scriptural truths because they approach their Bible study with
preconceived ideas and they make the Scriptures fit the theology they have accepted
or may have inherited from the religions that have instructed them.
Many religions pride themselves on the fact that they have taken nothing away from
the Scriptures. And this actually may be true. However, by adding and accepting
teachings that were never a part of primitive Christian theology, they have, in
essence, corrupted, in their own minds, the sayings of Jesus.
Therefore, as previously stated, the corruption of Christianity came not so much from what was taken away
from it but what was added to it.
Sincerely yours,
"Profesor" S. Douglas Robinson C.
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