Glorydaz does not need my help but I thought I'd throw in my two cents. This is done more for my own benefit than anyone else's. I just feel the need to move through this material and put into my own words....
Both John's message and his audience was different than Paul's. There are huge amounts of overlap between the two but in regards to salvation and sanctification, the two are quite different indeed.
There are lots of doctrinal issues that Christians disagree about. Many are not content with mere disagreement either. Many, if not most all the divisions within the church revolves around issues that have to do with what is required of us to either get saved, stay saved and or live the Christian life. Whether water baptism is required is probably the biggest one of them all. There's just crazy amounts of division and even real anger and hatred generated over a religious ritual that takes up a very few minutes of a person's life.
That isn't the only such issue though. There are disagreements about....
- which day of the week should we have church on (i.e. should we keep the Sabbath)
- will the rapture happen and if so when
- should a believer avoid eating various foods
- is it a problem to be or to get circumcised
- should believers expect to see or experience physical miracles
- is doing good works required of the believer to either get or stay saved
- can believers lose their salvation
All of these issues, and several others as well, are more directly related than they might seem and they are all properly resolved in the same way.
Usually when people study to get an answer to any of these issues, they look at them one at a time and go through the bible, collect all the biblical material that seems pertinent and go from there. There will be some passages that seem to teach one side of the issue and other passages that teach the other. Depending on which side of the issue you're on, one of these two sets of scripture will be proof texts and the other will be problem texts. Regardless of which side you're on, you'll have to decide how to deal with the problem texts. Some try to explain how they don't mean what they seem to mean, others simply ignore the problem texts altogether. There are thousands of books that have been written based on this exact formula with just as many on one side as there are on the other of any of these topics. That's great for the book selling industry but I'm not so sure is all that good for anyone else.
Well, what if there was a way to resolve all of these issues and others like it where you didn't have any problem texts? Where you could read Romans 4:5 and James 2:24, take them BOTH to mean precisely what they seem to be saying, yet without conflict, without any need to make one say the same thing as the other?
There is such a way!
If you care to notice, all of the issues I've listed and several others as well, all revolve around the Apostle Paul. There are people, for example, who believe you can lose your salvation and other who do not. The proof texts for one group will be in every book of the bible other than those written by Paul and the proof texts for the other group will virtually all be in the books written by Paul. Same goes for the issue of water baptism requirements. Same goes for the timing of the rapture. Same goes for water baptism. Etc. One set of proof texts were written by Paul, the other set by everyone else who wrote a book of the bible. (There are minor exceptions to this but it is generally the case to an extent that mere coincidence cannot account for.)
To be clear, I am not suggesting that the divide between one side or the other on these issues has to do with one group or the other having some sort of personal preference for or against Paul. It isn't some sort of self fulfilling prophesy where there is some sort of pre-existing bias that is creating this distinction. The distinction happens because there is an actual difference between what Paul seems to be teaching and what everyone else in the bible seems to be teaching.
Regardless of why or how this distinction happens, the fact is that it does happen and does so mostly without anyone noticing it. What most people do is focus almost entirely on their proof texts and if they look at their problem texts at all, their efforts are spent trying to understand them in a manner that agrees with their proof texts. It doesn't matter which set of passages are the proof texts and which are the problem texts. Both sides do effectively the same thing just in reverse of each other. If you're a Southern Baptist then the book you write about whether you can lose your salvation is going to spend 85% of the pages focused on passages written by Paul and the rest of the time explaining how any passage that seems to teach that you can lose your salvation is being misunderstood. If, on the other hand, you're a Free Will Baptist then your book will do the exact same thing except the proof and problem texts will be reversed.
Again, this all happens mostly without anyone making any intentional distinction about Paul or not Paul. Most don't even notice that this is where the dividing line happens to land but, whether one is aware of it or not, whichever camp you end up in on any of these issues comes down to whether you interpret the bible in light of Paul's teachings or if you interpret Paul in light of the Peter, James and John (and Jesus by the way).
But what if both camps are wrong?
I mean, some of these issues are pretty much binary in nature, right. You can either lose your salvation or you cannot. There isn't a third option and so one of these camps is right and the other is wrong on that issue but what if the camp that lands on the right answer does so in spite of a faulty manner of reading and understand the Bible in general and the New Testament in particular? What if there was a way to read both sets of passages and take them all to mean precisely what it seems like they mean and not have any conflict between them whatsoever? As I asked earlier, what if there was a way to read Romans 4:5 and James 2:24, take them BOTH to mean precisely what they seem to be saying, yet without conflict, without any need to interpret one in light of the other? What if you could land on what you can be confident of being the right answer on any of these issues and have NO PROBLEM TEXTS whatsoever?
If there was such a way, do you suppose that God would have included such a teaching in His word?
I submit to you that there is such a way and that it is totally included in God's word, as plain as day. In fact, the entire idea can be boiled down to one single sentence and that sentence is in the New Testament! It is a sentence that you have no doubt read dozens of times and all it takes to be able to read the bible and have all the confusion evaporate like a mist in the late morning Sun is to take that single sentence to mean what it plainly states. No need for fancy dictionaries, no need to read the bible in Greek or Hebrew, no fancy translation tricks or other mumbo-jumbo. All you have to do is read it, take it to mean what it flatly states and then apply that when you read the rest of the Bible.
Care to know what that sentence is?
Clete
5 Casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ;"
