God's Word must be taken or rejected in full. If you accepted as the law of God, then you cannot pick and choose what to accept, for it is said in itself to be perfect and eternal, just like God. Either you follow God's law in whole (the straight and narrow path) or not. Those who pick and choose and follow their custom-built religions in defiance of God's law, refusing to obey all His commandments are following the wide and winding road to damnation and are blind to their own foolishness and fate.
These are the teachings of God, as revealed in the Holy Niecene Library ('Bible'), in all its current canons.
you and manifold are both correct. that your postition seems less understood is why i post this to you.
in the beginning there was the word, and the word was god. the bible is the word of god. to reject any part of it is to defy the judeo christian god. many christians do just that. example: homosexuality is an "abomination" according to the KJV (
to evah), as is eating shellfish
to evah, as is wearing blended cloth
to evah. this from leviticus. and
to evah roughly translates as "ritual uncleanliness". many christians, wearing their poly cotton blends and chomping away at red lobster tell gays they are an abomination. and many if not all who do this call themselves "literalists", meaning they take the bible at its word and at face value. THEN they justify
why they can wear blended clothes, and yet still see homosexuality as an abomination. that is them playing god, no matter the amount of doctrine used to convince, it is playing god.
Deuteronomy 21:18-21
"
If a man has a stubborn and rebellious son who does not obey his father and mother and will not listen to them when they discipline him, 19 his father and mother shall take hold of him and bring him to the elders at the gate of his town. 20 They shall say to the elders, "This son of ours is stubborn and rebellious. He will not obey us. He is a profligate and a drunkard." 21 Then all the men of his town shall stone him to death."
of course, christians with rebellious children dont do this either. and they will justify that by saying it is against the secular law. they are then saying they fear and obey man over their own god.
enter doctrine. doctrine is "spin". it is the same as "discovering" new rights that conservatives hate when the supreme court does it, but they love it when doctrine spins away the need to do some things like stoning disobedient children when considering following their gods word.
it is suggested the NT is the new covenant, and all christians are governed by that instead of the OT. that sits well with christians, especially liberal christians, because jesus emphasized the internal and social justice, rather than the unforgiving god of the OT and the external. the conservative christians love it also, but much less, because they are told to not stone prostitutes, and then add in to that new covenant parts from the OT they like-such as condemning homosexuals, etc.
either the word is god, or it isn't. some do not take the bible literally, and that is a danger also, because the individual picks what they want to believe of the bible, and discards the rest. in truth, that is what the literalists do, just to a much lesser degree. so indeed, all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of [the judeo christian] god.
in truth, very very few actually know the word of their god. the KJV, a favorite (and some preachers claim that it is the only true bible,and all other versions are of satan) is not the best or most accurate translation. few christians seek to understand the hebrew culture and other contextual nuances, and so have no real idea what their god said or meant.
edit: (lol!) morals are doing what is right. the bible has morals. we all have morals, although we might not agree on what is "right". morals must be understood from within the system. sure, you or others can see that it is immoral to stone a disobedient child, that doesn't make the act immoral, just outside the system. if one believes in a god, then whatever that god says to do is moral.
