- The Jewish Leaders Vs. the Church Leaders of Today
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- Another teaching of the DOT is that those who oppose it are seen doing the same thing
that the Jewish Leaders did at the time of Jesus. Those in church leadership positions
such as Pastors, Elders, and Deacons are being placed in the same category as the Jewish
Leaders of the temple at the time of Christ.
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- After the Lord Jesus went back to Heaven, ten days later the Holy Spirit came upon the
believers in Jerusalem on Pentecost. This day was when the gospel started being preached
to the masses. On that first Pentecost day when the Apostles started preaching there were
Jews from many parts of the known world in Jerusalem at that time.
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- Once the believers started to preach the gospel, that people can become saved, even
Gentiles, without keeping the Mosaic Law, this started to become troubling to the leaders
of the Temples and synagogues. For almost 1500 years, the Jewish people were under the
Mosaic Law and now all of a sudden Jews are preaching that one can be saved without the
ceremonial laws. Well, this did not sit pretty with the Jewish leaders because if the
sacrificial system was through, so were they!
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- What were they to do? Initially, they began to threaten the Apostles not to teach this
new doctrine of the sect of the Nazarenes. They even got to the point they were sending
people to the churches to claim they had to keep the ceremonial law, namely circumcisions,
along with grace, to become saved. This of course led to the first Jerusalem Council
concerning the subject of circumcision and the gospel. Well, the Jewish Leaders did not
get their way and they were instrumental in opposing the teaching of the true gospel.
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- (Acts 24:14 KJV) But this I confess unto thee, that after the way which they call
heresy, so worship I the God of my fathers, believing all things which are written in the
law and in the prophets:
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- Here was Paul before Felix the Governor and Paul was stating that the way or
the true gospel was being spoken of as a heresy. Remember, the definition of heresy, it
was something divisive. Paul was literally telling Felix that the true Gospel was a
divisive thing because it was causing consternation for many. Even Felix, trembled and
sent Paul away.
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- The Erroneous Comparison
- The DOT people continue to accuse any church leader of being like the Pharisees of old
if they oppose the DOT. However, the comparison fails miserably on two counts.
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- First, the comparison is being made between the Jewish leaders and the Church leaders.
The Jewish leaders were unsaved people who were not opposing a mere teaching but the
propagation of the true gospel. You cannot compare the unsaved Jewish leaders to saved
Church leaders. The Church leaders I see opposing the DOT are those who are children of
God. The second erroneous comparison, is the DOT people are equating the true gospel to
the Depart Out Teachings. This is absolutely forbidden, for there is no teaching which is
equal to Scripture itself.
So one group has the Holy Spirit dwelling in them and the other group did not. Again,
it is the comparison of the saved and unsaved to make a teaching sound true. Fallacious
hermeneutics!