Back and Proof-Texting

I'm back I have had some personal turmoil for the last several months that has occupied time away from blogging. But I am back ready to confront the false doctrine and heresy that has perverted itself throughout Christendom. This perversion most specifically plays itself out in Mainline Denomiations, like the Evangelical Lutheran Church of America to which I formerly belonged. I am currently in my last year at a Seminary in this denomiation- Luther Seminary.

At Luther, we have a Senior Biblical Theology class led by a professor who seems to consider himself "confessional" and "conservative", this might sound good but it's not. To give you an example of this guy's Biblical Hermaneutic, he has said on more than one occasion in regards to Homosexuality- "That we can't just proof-text seven verses and come to an answer on this question" . This professor also wrote an article entitled "The heresy of infalliability". So this should give you a good idea who you are dealing with.

So I better respond to his objections over proof-texting. Well this is a ridicolous statement in the first place since most major doctrines especially within Lutheranism are based on a few scripture texts. No one would ever say something like you can't just base a doctrine of the Lord's Supper on 1 Corinthians 10, or a doctrine of Baptism on Matthew 28. No one would say you can't just proof-text Romans 1 for the doctrine of justification. All major doctrines are based on specific texts.

I would also challenge whether this is proof-texting this isn't some argument citing some scripture passages against the other, the whole weight of Biblical evidence states that Homosexuality is sinful. A proof-text is meant to state what the Bible says and it seems to be pretty uniamous as to it's statement.

The last idea I should challenge is with such a statement as the professor's proof-texting statement. It would seem scripture has no authority, which it really doesn't but he wouldn't open say that. Instead, what has authority is some Christian-Centric hermeanutic. Never mind this hermeanutic often makes the end result totally subjective. I talked about it some here http://emerti.blogspot.com/2005/09/generic-gospel.html.

The idea that since Christ was welcoming, or tolerant, or loved people this argument takes many forms, we should bless homosexual behavior. Never mind that Jesus constantly tries to change people from their live of sin.

This also raises a problem since it is poor scripture intrepretation. For scripture speaks as either law or gospel to the situation it address. In Romans 1:26-27, it is addressing homosexuality as sinful behavior. You can't just make up some vague ethic and apply it however you want. Scripture still determines doctrine as it did for Christ. Scripture either has authority or it doesn't, it doesn't have authority in the sense we want it to have authority.