>>19093811 PB

On Paine

Panel 1 - Cheers

Panel 2 - Cheers, but we no longer have national churches and not all Christians have subscribed to them.

Panel 3 - Cheers - again, speaking of national churches. One may argue that 401.c.3. churches are national churches having bowed the knee to the IRS. Not all Christians subscribe. Universal application is a strawman.

Panel 4 - "revelation is not second hand.." True enough. This is why each person can and must have direct revelation from God. He says you may know before you believe [trust].

Isa 43:10 Ye [are] my witnesses, saith the LORD, and my servant whom I have chosen: that ye may know and believe me, and understand that I [am] he: before me there was no God formed, neither shall there be after me.

However, we cannot believe that Thomas Paine said what is in his book by the same reasoning he makes. I did not get it from him. I got it from a publisher who says it was Thomas Paine who wrote it. I cannot get a direct communication from Thomas Paine as I have from God. Perhaps it came from the devil himself. It has the same ring as the voice of the serpent, "Has God [really] said?"

When Moses received the tablets from God, it was by the invitation of the 'congregation'. They heard for themselves the voice of God and were afraid. They sent Moses to see what he would say to them. So yes. They were obligated. Those who thought they were not found themselves dying in the desert.

"The commandments carry no supernatural elements to them." Poor Thomas did not see it. He did not even understand them. The law was not given as a set of moral precepts. "The Lamb was slain before the foundation of the world".

They were given to confront your egotistical claim to be a god and religion unto yourself. Gods do not lie, steal or covet. God knew that man could not keep them. But provided a way of grace when they discovered they were not gods.

Do you try to learn to cross your eyes and see 3D blotches from someone who says there is nothing there? or from one who says he can teach you how to see.

Those who follow Paine have made him a God by blind belief as so many Christians follow blindly. And they are the sorriest of the lot because they follow a blind man.