thedirtysailor.com

http://bible.org/article/non-pauline-epistles

The book of 2 John:

7 For many deceivers have gone out into the world, people who do not confess Jesus as Christ coming in the flesh.

This seems to be the big controversy of the time, as John writes about it several times. The warnings against false prophets and false teachers is especially important because the young church is at a growing point here, and if a new (wrong) idea took hold and infected the stalk of the church, so to speak, then everything that grew out of it would be diseased.

http://bible.org/article/non-pauline-epistles

The book of First John:

2:1 (My little children, I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin.) But if anyone does sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous One; 2:2 and he himself is the atoning sacrifice for our sins, and not only for our sins but also for the whole world.

My little children, I am writing these things to you.

You = “my little children”, the young Christians.

Our = you + me.

Jesus is the atoning sacrifice for our sins (John + the young Christian believers), and also for the whole world.

Who is the whole world?

Everyone else.

Jesus is the atoning sacrifice for the sins of the whole world. Not some of them. All of them.

http://bible.org/article/non-pauline-epistles

Regarding the book of 2 Peter:

3:8-11. Now, dear friends, do not let this one thing escape your notice, that a single day is like a thousand years with the Lord and a thousand years are like a single day. 3:9 The Lord is not slow concerning his promise, as some regard slowness, but is being patient toward you, because he does not wish for any to perish but for all to come to repentance.

Amidst the discussion of false teachers, there’s this section. This has been used to explain how the apostles were describing the “day of the Lord” as being just about to happen, and here we are 2000 years later. If a thousand years are like a single day, then this is Tuesday and perhaps the Day of the Lord is coming on Friday, so to speak.

But here’s the phrase that jumps out at me: “he does not wish for any to perish but for all to come to repentance.” Now first, run that through your predestination filter and see what comes out the other side. But secondly, here’s the question: the Lord is delaying his judgment because he wishes that none should perish and that all will have a chance for repentance. How is that helped by delaying? I could understand if the phrase was “that more would come to repentance”, because you could argue that by delaying for 2000 years, certainly more people have come to repent of their sins. But the pool of all is still the same. Every day more people are born and more people die, and most of them die without hearing the message of the gospel. So not all of them can be saved.

http://bible.org/article/non-pauline-epistles

From 1st Peter:

While 1 Peter touches on various doctrines and has much to say about Christian life and Christian responsibilities, the theme and purpose of 1 Peter centers around the problem of suffering—particularly suffering in the form of persecution for one’s faith. It has been described as a manual or handbook showing Christians how they are to live as temporary resident and ambassadors of Christ in an alien and hostile world.

It sounds a little strange, but I think we have lost the aspect of “suffering” which is dealt with many times in the NT. Our attitude now seems to be that we need to make the world conform to us, and our needs and desires. That seems like a far cry from the suffering for Christ’s sake that Peter talks about.

http://bible.org/article/non-pauline-epistles

Writing about the book of James:

1:22 But be sure you live out the message and do not merely listen to it and so deceive yourselves.

This is a painfully convicting verse. It’s very easy to listen and forget five minutes later, or even listen and critique the message or the presentation. It’s most difficult to listen and then live out the message.

http://bible.org/article/non-pauline-epistles

Writing about the book of Hebrews:

Many suggestions have been made for the author of this anonymous book—Paul, Barnabas, Apollos, Silas, Aquila and Priscilla, and Clement of Rome. There are both resemblances and dissimilarities to the theology and style of Paul, but Paul frequently appeals to his own apostolic authority in his letters, while this writer appeals to others who were eyewitnesses of Jesus’ ministry (2:3). It is safest to say, as did the theologian Origen in the third century, that only God knows who wrote Hebrews.⁷⁵

I think it’s fascinating to have this book which is accepted as canon, The Word of God, and we don’t know who wrote it. That may be true of OT books as well, for that matter. The theology and text of the book are sufficient to have it be accepted into the circle of inspired works.

http://bible.org/seriespage/1-thessalonians-213-and-emerging-canon-consciousness

“And so we too constantly thank God that when you received God’s message that you heard from us, you accepted it not as a human message, but as it truly is, God’s message, which is at work among you who believe” (NET).

There’s an interesting discussion here about whether Paul knew that he was writing “scripture” – as in, what would become scripture, and carry the same weight as the OT canon. The author makes the point that if he does, then this is the first indication that the apostles are writing in a self-referential style. However, the phrase “God’s message” or “God’s word” also refers to the teaching that the apostles were doing, which was not the written word of the OT but instead their testimony about the life of Jesus and the Kingdom of God.

http://bible.org/seriespage/canonicity

“Canon” is a word that comes from Greek and Hebrew words that literally means a measuring rod. So canonicity describes the standard that books had to meet to be recognized as scripture.

The tests for canonization included whether the book was self-referential (i.e, whether it claimed to be authoritative), and whether the book was accepted in the community.

http://bible.org/article/authority-bible

Jesus even specifically affirmed as historical several disputed stories of the Old Testament. He affirms as true the accounts of Adam and Eve (Matthew 19:4-5), Noah and the flood (Matthew 24:39), Jonah and the whale (Matthew 12:40), Sodom and Gomorrah (Matthew 10:15), and more.

Is it possible for the Bible to be divinely inspired and yet not be literally true? Or at least parts of it? For example, is it possible to say that Jesus really spoke about Adam and Eve, but that he was referring to them in the same sense that we would refer to Hercules or John Henry or Sarah Connor – which is to say, a shared cultural figure based in myth and not in literal reality. Is that interpretation possible?

http://bible.org/seriespage/shall-we-know-each-other-heaven

From time immemorial men have held to the doctrine of recognition in the future life. Like an unbroken thread in human history, there has been a deep conviction in man’s spirit that the purpose of being created could not be fulfilled in his short-lived visit in this life.

The ancient Athenian philosopher Socrates could say that since “death conveys us to those regions which are inhabited by the spirits of departed men, will it not be unspeakably happy to escape from the hands of mere nominal judges? Is it possible for you to look upon this as an unimportant journey? Is it nothing to converse with Orpheus, and Homer, and Hesiod? Believe me, I could cheerfully suffer many a death on condition of realizing such a privilege. With what pleasure could I leave the world, to hold communion with Palamedes, Ajax, and others!”

It’s kind of interesting that the author points to historical commonalities to pursue the idea of a shared after-death experience across cultures, but he doesn’t then make the point that all of these cultures, except for the Jewish one, are doomed to hell and will not in fact have this pleasant privilege of communing with their friends, relatives, ancestors, and luminaries in the afterlife.

Belaboring the point for a minute: I think that is one of the biggest objections to Christianity, as presented.