Appendix: Reference Notes (3 of 5)

King James Only

1. The 47 scholars who produced the King James Bible used Greek manuscripts, Hebrew nuances, lexicons, and scholarly reconstruction — exactly the methodology the closed-system argument says corrupts certainty. If their method was corrupting, how is their output trustworthy?
2. The King James Bible has appeared in multiple editions since 1611, with differences between the 1611 original and the 1769 Oxford text most readers hold today. Which edition is the perfect word of God — and by what method did you determine that?
3. The believers in Acts had no English Bible, no KJV, no concordance, and they turned the Roman Empire upside down. People in Iran are coming to Christ right now through visions with no Bible in their house. What does the closed system say about their access to the word of God?

The Institutional Exemption Claim

1. Between approximately 300 and 1000 AD, what is the documentary record of the unbroken line of true churches your tradition traces? Not which groups resisted Rome — which documents connect them to each other as an institutional succession?
2. The 27 books of your New Testament were identified and affirmed at councils that had Rome at the table. If your churches were never part of the Catholic transmission chain, by what process did the correct 27 books arrive in your hands rather than some other collection?
3. If your tradition's exemption from the critique of tradition is itself a tradition — one that emerged historically, spread through a specific community, and now feels like Scripture itself when examined — what would you see if you applied to that exemption claim the same examination you are applying to everyone else's traditions?

Baptism by Immersion Only

1. The Didache — a first-century Christian document written when members of the apostolic generation were still living — allowed pouring when sufficient water was unavailable. If the mode was settled in the absolute way the tradition requires, why didn't the earliest post-apostolic generation treat it that way?
2. When you decline fellowship with a sincere believer baptized by a different mode, whose standard are you applying — the apostles' standard from Acts 15:28, or a standard that arrived later?
3. What does the mode of baptism accomplish in a person's relationship with God that the reality baptism signifies does not accomplish regardless of mode?

Westminster Confession / 1689 London Baptist Confession as De Facto Scripture

1. The men who wrote these confessions stated explicitly that they were subordinate standards subject to revision by Scripture. When their heirs treat these documents as co-equal with the Text, whose view of the confessions is more faithful — the original authors' or their heirs'?
2. If a serious believer reads the same Text the Confession summarizes and arrives at a different conclusion on a secondary question, are they outside the faith — or outside the tradition? How do you distinguish between the two?
3. When did you last open the passage a confession article rests on to find out what it says, rather than to confirm that the confession summarized it correctly?

Regulative Principle and Exclusive Psalmody

1. Ephesians 5:19 mentions psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs. If the Regulative Principle restricts corporate worship to biblical psalms only, what does Paul mean by "hymns" and "spiritual songs" — and does your method of answering that question require you to go outside the text?
2. Calvin held the Regulative Principle. Luther did not. Both read the same Text. When you divide fellowship over this question, whose authority are you actually appealing to — Scripture, or the tradition that decided this was the right reading of it?
3. Is there a single verse in the New Testament that commands the church to sing only the 150 Psalms — or is that conclusion a tradition derived from a principle that is itself a tradition?

Mandatory Tithing as New Covenant Law

1. The tithe in Malachi 3:10 was agricultural produce brought to the Levitical storehouse of a theocratic economy that no longer exists. What textual move is required to apply that command to New Covenant believers — and was that move made by an apostle or by a tradition?
2. 2 Corinthians 9:7 removes both the percentage and the compulsion. If the New Testament explicitly does this, what authority overrides it to put them back?
3. When you require a specific percentage as a binding New Covenant obligation, are you placing on the congregation a burden the apostles — who had the opportunity at Jerusalem in Acts 15:28 — chose not to place?

Hard Sabbatarianism

1. Colossians 2:16–17 says do not let anyone judge you with respect to Sabbath days — these are a shadow and the reality is Christ. Romans 14:5–6 says each person must be fully convinced in their own mind. If these texts do not support making Sabbath observance a binding requirement, what does?
2. The Sunday Sabbath requirement is the Westminster Confession applied to the Lord's Day — not a New Testament command. When did you last read those passages asking what they actually say, rather than what the Confession requires them to say?
3. When you apply a Sabbath requirement to a believer who holds a different reading of these texts, are you producing what the Sabbath was designed to produce — rest and delight in God — or are you producing a burden? Which of those outcomes does the Text prioritize?

Total Abstinence from Alcohol

1. John 2:10 records Jesus making wine at Cana. The Greek word is oinos — wine. What textual argument allows the total abstinence tradition to require what Jesus Himself did not require of the guests He was serving?
2. The total abstinence requirement entered Baptist and Methodist culture through the 19th century American temperance movement, not through the New Testament. Scripture condemns drunkenness. Scripture does not require abstinence. When you treat abstinence as the binding standard, which document are you actually following?
3. If a sincere believer in your community drinks wine with dinner — as Jesus drank wine at Passover — are you prepared to say they are violating Scripture? If yes, which verse? If no, what has the tradition produced in you that leads you to treat it as equivalent to one?

Limited Atonement as Settled and Unquestionable

1. 1 John 2:2 says Christ is the atoning sacrifice "not only for our sins but also for the whole world." 1 Timothy 2:6 says He "gave Himself as a ransom for all." If Limited Atonement is the plain teaching of Scripture, what is the plain teaching of these verses — and who explained them away, the Text or the tradition?
2. The Synod of Dort produced these five points in 1618. The apostle John wrote before that. When these two are in tension, which one has final authority — and does your answer apply symmetrically to the traditions this document asks you to examine in other communities?
3. In communities where questioning Limited Atonement is treated as questioning Scripture itself, when did Dort acquire that authority — and did Dort claim it for itself?