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Thread: Doctrine and Semantics 101

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    Senior Member Peggy Gray's Avatar

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    Doctrine and Semantics 101

    Recently I heard a Nazarene church board member state, "The Church of the Nazarene believes that the Bible is the inerrant, infallible Word of God...." Doing a little googling, I have seen the same phrase on several Church of the Nazarene local church websites.

    I wonder if these people are closet Fundamentalists? If they understand "inerrant", "innerancy", "innerantly revealing the will of God" as interchangeable in definition? If I'm misunderstanding what they are saying?

    I am currently reading (studying) "Square Peg" by Truesdale for the second time, underlining more sentences and dog-earing more pages. I've been a member of the Church of the Nazarene for 40 years, and I am finding things that were never truly clear to me before.

    Please don't understand this as insulting the intelligence of any of my fellow Nazarenes, but the book has not been an easy read for me, and I suspect that an "average" church member in many churches might feel the same. Is there a similar, recent book or denominational study material which is on a simpler level?

    I'm not expressing myself well, and I apologize. I'm not even sure what my point is, other than I think there are a lot of people in churches who either don't agree with Nazarene doctrine but think they do, or else they KNOW they don't agree and don't think it matters. I think it matters.

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    Senior Member Steven Burton's Avatar

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    Re: Doctrine and Semantics 101

    I have found that many do not understand (or know) what the Nazarene church believes. They also don't seem to really care about learning our doctrine either. Its easier to go with mainstream than to swim a different path.
    "Means we use must be as pure as the ends we seek."
    Thanks Jon Bemis, Hans Deventer, Paul DeBaufer, Peggy Gray - "thanks" for this post

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    Senior Member Wilson Deaton's Avatar

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    Re: Doctrine and Semantics 101

    One of the big contributing issues...

    We have some lattitude in what we believe. As a Nazarene preacher I may believe in a God-directed evolution OR believe in Young Earth Creation. The problem arises if I preach/teach my particular view as if it is THEE Nazarene belief.

    Wilson
    "But by the grace of God I am what I am." (1 Cor. 15:10)

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    Re: Doctrine and Semantics 101

    Quote Originally Posted by Wilson Deaton View Post
    One of the big contributing issues...

    We have some lattitude in what we believe. As a Nazarene preacher I may believe in a God-directed evolution OR believe in Young Earth Creation. The problem arises if I preach/teach my particular view as if it is THEE Nazarene belief.

    Wilson
    I have tried to share various viewpoints on the "non-essentials" when they come up and
    why it is non-essential to our faith.

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