tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5134334119712954076.post2451743645600210596..comments2022-11-20T01:03:33.741-08:00Comments on Bloggolalia: Give me more fire, LORD!Joshua Elsomhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06893957736794598118noreply@blogger.comBlogger1125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5134334119712954076.post-28300021451097984872014-02-21T02:07:10.840-08:002014-02-21T02:07:10.840-08:00Thanks for the response Josh.
Believe it or not, ...Thanks for the response Josh.<br /><br />Believe it or not, I didn't just attend a charismatic church for a little while. I spent around a decade as an intellectual defender of the Canadian Apostolic Churches of Pentecost. I was more of a Michael Brown than a back pew warmer and was a rather settled continuationist.<br /><br />I'm well familiar with Acts 2:1-4 and the inter-textual connection with Exodus 3:3, 13:21-22, 14:24, etc. I included the reference in Acts 2:3 in point 1, where it was physical fire. I could have included it in point 2c, but I didn't simply because the Bible makes a implicit connection (an inter-textual connection/allusion), not an explicit one.<br /><br />My post wasn't a "lexical analysis of the words אֵשׁ and πῦρ"; I stated in the beginning that I was actually discussing the occurrences of "fire" in the ESV. In my fourth paragraph, I said "There’s only one real way to objectively answer the question. Let’s <br />plug through all 430 occurrences of “fire” in the ESV (and let’s be <br />honest: most people who use the term aren’t doing original language <br />exegesis)". That's why I didn't include the cognates that you addressed, though I mention the original language terms in the second paragraph after the picture following point 4.<br /><br />When you mention other manifestations of God in the OT, you go beyond the scope of my focused article too; God's appearances in earthquakes is not directly related to his appearances in fire, hence I didn't include them. The article would have been unwieldy if I did (and I think pretty much everyone finds me verbose enough).<br /><br />Your use of loosely related terms (1 Thess. 5:19, Luke 24:32; Jer. 20:9) is somewhat desperate to make your point (and I included Jeremiah 20:9 in my article too). You cannot overturn an established pattern with 2 verses, neither of which includes the term in question, and both of which are obvious metaphors.<br /><br />You apparently missed the point of the article, at least when it comes to your objections. The main usage of fire in the scripture is one of physical fire, and then the term "fire" appears in a metaphor, it is still a metaphor where the fire is actual fire. "Fire" is never used as shorthand for "passion" or "the power of the Holy Spirit in your life", even in Acts 2. In Acts 2 there were tongues that looked like little fires over everyone's heads. If you're going to use Acts 2 as some sort of proof, you need to be searching for some sort of physical manifestations (not passion in the heart). I don't know anyone who does this, short of the most unstable members of the tinfoil hat brigade.<br /><br />As for your poppycock comment (good term, but the way!), you also seem to have missed what I was getting at. I never suggested that "God is so capricious that he might just make charismatics suffer for using the word fire wrongly" but I was rather suggesting that God does indeed "discern the thoughts and intentions of the heart praying for fire". I'm surprised that you'd think I would so blatantly confuse Yahweh with Allah.<br /><br />The increased fire of intimacy comes through suffering, hence when people pray for "fire" and they experience suffering, God is giving them what they are asking for. God hears past their inarticulate request because he is loving and gracious, not capricious. Cancer isn't punishment either; we suffer because God loves us and sanctifies us through suffering. I hope that's not a foreign idea to you, but I don't know where you sit in that theological spectrum.<br /><br />I don't know you, so I don't know what to expect of you.<br /><br />Here's a little word of advice though. Jerking knees tend to only break the teeth connected to the knee. They don't call me "Toothless Joe" for nothing.Lyndon Ungernoreply@blogger.com