Ok- I wouldn’t really shoot them. But I would take their cell phone.

(seriously, though- they’d get hurt)

The grace of God and His mercy were paramount in these writings. This whole idea that we have to scare people into heaven so that they have “fire insurance” is actually unbiblical.

Precisely. Doing something purely for form’s sake would have been recognized by the early Church as a hallmark of paganism.

And thanks for pointing out the ulterior motives behind some of the KJV translators’ word choice. Sarah Ruden, a classicist who has translated Virgil and Aristophanes, recently published a very good book called Paul Among the People. She places St. Paul in his proper historical context, one of the issues she tackles being the word ekklesia.

As far as the word “church”, that’s a mandated word from the KJV translators. The word originally used was “congregation” as far back as Tyndale. “Ecclesia” has always referred to an assembly and not a building. The KJV translators were instructed to keep certain words in that would keep people in bondage to the Church of England’s power. That’s why the Puritan’s refused to “bow the knee” to the king of England and left for America (carrying Geneva Bibles and not KJV’s as is so often stated from fundy pulpits).

As far “child evangelism”, I’m not opposed to children being saved. I’m opposed to trickery & deceit just to fatten numbers and look good for all the other pastors & churches.

As far as the “church” proper, it wasn’t a place where evangelism took place. It was for the believer to be fed and to minister to one another. Look up “one another” and see how many times it’s mentioned in the NT. Yes, unbelievers did come to these assemblies but the focus was on Jesus Christ (the Good News) and His sheep.

If the reality of a biblical hell is a reality, then scaring the “bee-jeebers” out of anyone would be a smart way to go.

Also since Jesus used these manipulative tactics to get folks to make decisions. Or was that Paul who used these manipulative tactics? Refresh my memory on who it was that used these tactics in the Scripture to get kids and teens to make decisions.