I am sure Pilgrim will respond, but until then,<br><br><blockquote><font size=1>In reply to:</font><hr>[color:"blue"]A preacher standing before a room of punk teenagers is not going to be well accepted and may even cause all of those people to leave. But a band of people who are on their level, preaching to them in words they can understand and accepting them in hopes that God may save some...that is a biblical mindset.... 1 Cor 9:22</font><hr></blockquote><p> So, if I reason this way than I should become an adulterer, so I can minister to adulators, or a pornographer, so I can minister to pornographers, or a child molester, so I can minister to child molesters? After all each of these embraces a form of "weakness" if I use the term in the manner in which you think it is meant.<br><br>You have taken Augustine's argument and more importantly the Scripture and made an equivocal error. Augustine said [color:red]have said things which are indeed true and are well accommodating to our faith</font color=red>. So, the first question you must ask yourself: Is adultery true and accommodating to our faith? NO, Is pornography true and accommodating to our faith? NO, Is child molestation true and accommodating to our faith? Is rock music true and accommodating to our faith, when its roots are ingrained in rites honoring the pagan deities Cybele, Bacchus, and Dionysius (including ecstatic noises accompanied by gongs, cymbals, and trumpets), et. al.? NO!!!<br><br>Weakness in 1 Cor 9:22, far from meaning that we must become "worse" sinners than we already are to minister to another sinner, means within the bounds of God’s Word, we should not offend the Jew, Gentile, or those weak in understanding... and thus stoop to their level of understanding. But, Paul did not mean changing Scripture or compromising the truth in an attempt to stoop.. <br><br>As Calvin says,<br><br>Now, if we consider how great a man Paul was, who stooped thus far, ought we not to feel ashamed — we who are next to nothing in comparison with him — if, bound up in self, we look with disdain upon the weak, and do not deign to yield up a single point to them? But while it is proper that we should accommodate ourselves to the weak, according to the Apostle’s injunction, and that, in things indifferent, and with a view to their edification, those act an improper part, who, with the view of consulting their own ease, avoid those things that would offend men, and the wicked, too, rather than the weak. Those, however, commit a two-fold error, [color:blue]who do not distinguish between things indifferent and things unlawful, and accordingly do not hesitate, for the sake of pleasing men, to engage in things that the Lord has prohibited.</font color=blue> [color:red]The crowning point, however, of the evil is this — that they abuse this statement of Paul to excuse their wicked dissimulation.</font color=red> <br><br>Calvin, John. Calvin's Commentaries: 1 Corinthians. electronic ed. Logos Library System;Calvin's Commentaries, 1 Co 9:22. Albany, OR: Ages Software, 1998.

Reformed and Always Reforming,