Dear zs:

You said:
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I don't understand the cessationism.

There is more truth in that statement I am afraid than you realize.

I too had to come to a point where I understood that the Bible does not teach the continuance of the miraculous gifts, as gifts given to men, to be signs of God given authority to speak and act for God with the same authority that the Apostles and prophets had. So I appreciate your position. But you have not yet thought it through, nor seen the unfortunate, indeed tragic and dangerous implicatiions of your beliefs.

I believe in the miraculous. I have seen it with my own eyes. I am a scientist and I know how to evaluate objectively physical phenomena in the sense of distinguishing between "what appears to be" and "what is".

I believe that God still does miraculous things, and more often than many suspect, but He gives NO MAN any longer, in my opinion, the ability to do so, and for very good and infinately wise reasons.

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The bible says, "these signs shall follow them that believe." I believe it. I put it down to unbelief.

The Bible says a lot of things that may be, and are, misinterpreted to the great grief and shame and distruction of many. You have already demonstrated to my satisfaction your inability to properly interpret scripture according to sound hermeneutics, good logic, and simple wisdom, so your statement does not surprise me.

You will no where find the word Trinity in the pages of Holy writ, but it is every where taught there, as are many other things of which I fear you have, in your simplicity, little knowledge or understanding.

I suggest you go and learn what this means:

"To give subtilty to the simple, to the young man knowledge and discretion." Proverbs 1:4

before you do yourself and others a great deal of harm.

Respectfully,

In Him,

Gerry