Bridges Community Church. We are a community of people who are seeking to grow in our understanding of who God is and what it means to walk with Him. We hope that, wherever you are in your spiritual journey, you are encouraged or challenged here. If we can be a help to you in any way, please let us know.
Mission Statement: Connecting our diverse community to God and becoming more Christ-like; growing in love for God, each other, and the world.
Remember in the tribal mentality of the time Moses and others were writing to their people. They only counted themselves as the chosen. God perhaps choose a tribe to start the journey through the evolution of faith. God created us all as his children. He loves us all equally. IMHO I can not believe he would create us just to be destroyed and die to hell because only one tribe is chosen to go to heaven. Man wrote the bible with his own biases, his own cultural understanding, and view of the entire world as he sees it.
They are similar because - news flash - humans make similar observations about humanity across the entire world. Christians, however, have added in this stupid inherent sin component because they are infested with low self-esteem.
Thank you for your comment and good question. Both Paul and Matthias could be considered apostles. Matthias was actually chosen to be the 12th, after Judas died (Acts 1:12-26), because he met the criteria of the other 11. And Paul is a special case in that, while he did not walk with Jesus during His 3-year ministry, the risen Jesus appeared to Paul on the road to Damascus (Acts 9; Galatians 2), which made Paul’s calling as an apostle certainly unique. So, who was the actual 12th apostle: Matthias or Paul? The other 11 apostles accepted and vouched for the ministry of both men (although, it may have taken a bit longer for Paul to win some over, due to his past before being converted). And while Matthias is never mentioned again in the New Testament, the same can be said for most of the other 11 apostles. Church history records that Matthias died as a martyr for Christ, as did many of the other apostles. Yes, Paul was more prominent than Matthias, but Paul was more prominent than most of the other apostles as well. The point is that cases can be made for either man being the “12th,” but the Bible doesn’t ever explicitly say one should be considered more legitimate than the other. And the larger point is that God used both men mightily in the early days of the Christian church, and He also invites any and all of us who follow Jesus to recognize that we too are "sent out" into the world as Jesus' representatives and as ambassadors for the gospel. Hope this helps! Thanks again for the question
