005 SCS The Good Thief

Welcome back to The Sad Catholic Show everyone!

I’m Sad, and this is MY show! If you know, you know. If you don’t know… go listen to episode one… then you WILL know.

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On today’s show I can’t help but to address these preachers that keep coming up in my reels, and on my feed. Maybe it’s just the algorithm showing them to me, but I’m sure you’ve seen them too.  It’s usually a young preacher, A “Bible Only” guy. He’s wearing torn jeans and bright sneakers. His hooded sweatshirt proudly has the name of his church on the front of it.

He’s pacing back and forth with a hand-held microphone, in front of a drum set and some guitars, on a big black stage with blue, purple and green can lights showing a rustic wood backdrop in an otherwise dark room… that may… or may not… be a movie theater.

The premise of his message seems to be: “You don’t need baptism because the good thief didn’t need baptism when Jesus told Him “Today you will be with me in Paradise.””

…there is so much more said in this short video that, I actually acquired a transcript of it that I have here in front of me. I want to look at it point by point and try to fix every one of these claims. The disinformation is strong in this one…To start off, we can’t go past the first 3 words, “The Good Thief”.

Tradition tells us that this is Saint Dismas… because we passed this information on to the next generation over the past 2,000 years. And Saint Dismas WAS a criminal sentenced to death. Luke chapter 23 verses 40 through 43 is everything Luke tells us about this “Good Thief” and Luke said he is a “criminal” …no mention of “thief.”

In Matthew Chapter 27 verses 38 through 44 the men on either side of Jesus are called “revolutionaries” not “thieves” and Matthew doesn’t record ANYTHING about one of them being “good”.

To the contrary. Matthew says in verse 44 “The revolutionaries who were crucified with him also kept abusing him.” No mention at all of one of them repenting.

Mark gives it ONE verse. Chapter 15 verse 27. “With him they crucified two revolutionaries, one on his right and one on his left.”

…That’s all that Mark has to say about that.

We have no proof whatsoever from scripture that Saint Dismas was a “thief”. Interesting take for a “Bible alone” guy. He had to have gotten that from some sort of “tradition” …but I digress.

The next claim by the Preacher is that “This man didn’t wear nice clothes.” I’m not sure exactly what that has to do with salvation… but if he truly was a thief, he must have been a bad one if he didn’t have any nice clothes.

Scripture tells us nothing of his wardrobe.

“He never went to Sunday School” is the next claim by this pastor. OF COURSE HE DIDN’T GO TO SUNDAY SCHOOL! Christians didn’t start gathering on Sundays until AFTER Jesus was raised from the dead… on a Sunday.

Then the Preacher says: “He didn’t go to Church.” This is a bold claim from this young man if he meant “Temple.” The Bible tells us nothing of Saint Dismas attendance in the synagogue. If he truly meant “Church” as he said… well, Jesus was still alive and literally held the very first Mass just the night before… like 18 hours ago… and only the 12 disciples were invited.

The next claim is “He didn’t go to Bible School.” OK, how could he? The first books of the New Testament wouldn’t even be written until a decade later, and the Canon of Scripture that makes up “The Bible” wouldn’t be established for another 350 years.

That’s like blaming the Pilgrims that landed on the shores at Plymouth in the year 16 20 for going hungry because they didn’t bring microwaves to cook their prepackaged TV Dinners. NONE OF THAT EXISTED YET!

“and He WASN’T BAPTIZED” the preacher goes on to say with EMPHASIS and AUTHORITY.  This was obviously a point that he really wanted to make… I have a few things to say about this.

First, Matthew Chapter 3 verse 5 says that “Jerusalem, ALL Judea, and the WHOLE region around the Jordan” were going out to John to be baptized.

Mark Chapter 1 verse 5 tells us that the “People of the WHOLE Judean countryside and ALL THE INHABITANTS OF JERUSELEM were going out to him (John the baptist) and were being baptized by him in the Jordan River as they acknowledged their sins.”

John Chapter 4 verse 1 tells us that Jesus was making and baptizing even more disciples than JOHN THE BAPTIST!

What an arrogant and ignorant claim to make, that this man on the cross wasn’t baptized. I’m sorry, well not sorry, but He likely WAS baptized. It appears as though everyone else in the region was, the Scriptures don’t say either way about Dismas, and guess what… it doesn’t matter anyway. And here’s why.

Baptism is a part of the NEW Covenant. The New Covenant was not put in place until Jesus put it in place, 40 days AFTER His resurrection when He said:  “All power in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you.  And behold, I am with you always, until the end of the age.”

These are literally the LAST words recorded in the book of Matthew.

So Saint Dismas died under the OLD Covenant. The Old Covenant didn’t require baptism.

The preacher wraps up with Jesus telling Dismas “ today You will be with me in paradise.” This was supposed to be the kicker. His point driven home… His conclusion. This was his proof that you don’t have to do any of the other stuff Jesus told us to do…

First I want to point out the fact that the Greek of the new Testament didn’t use ANY punctuation. The translators had to decide if it was “Truly I tell you (comma) Today you will be with me in Paradise?” or was it “Truly I tell you today (comma) you WILL be with me in paradise?”  That’s a pretty big difference, but even THAT Doesn’t matter because…

 “Paradise” also called “Abraham’s bosom”  is not the same thing as Heaven. In Luke Chapter 16 we are told about Abraham’s Bosom in the story of Lazarus and the Rich Man. Lazarus is in this place that isn’t yet Heaven and across a great chasm from those in torment. Lazarus WASN’T in torment like the Rich man was, Lazarus was chillin.

This is the place that good people went before Jesus came and opened the gates of Heaven. First Peter Chapter 3 tells us that Jesus went there to “preach to the spirits in prison.” This would include Lazarus… and Dismas! First Peter also tells us that there were people there from the days of Noah when only a few persons, eight in total, were saved through water…

And then the very next words in verse 21 are “This prefigured baptism, which saves you now”. It doesn’t get much clearer than that.

We know that Dismas DID NOT got to Heaven with Jesus on Good Friday. Jesus didn’t go there that day. Jesus died and went to the place of the dead… paradise, Abraham’s bosom… and preached to the imprisoned spirits there. Jesus then rose from the dead on Sunday, hung around another 40 days, and THEN ascended to Heaven.

Jesus didn’t say “43 days from now you will be with me in Heaven.”  Jesus would have said Heaven if he meant Heaven. There are 160 mentions of heaven in the Gospels alone, He wasn’t afraid of the word. He meant what He said when He said “Paradise.”

I’m honestly shocked that I heard this stuff about “the Good Thief” from a “Bible Alone” Preacher.  He went on for an hour about something recorded in just a couple verses… and taught what HE wanted it to say “between the lines.”  THAT is not teaching the “Bible alone.”

You guys… THIS is why we have Sacred Tradition… to keep us from falling into the holes of misinformation created by men interpreting things their own way. It also protects us from things like the King James Bible printed by the Royal Press in the year 16 31 that said in Exodus 20 “Though shalt commit adultery.”  I’ll talk more about that one in a future episode. As for the “Good Thief” …We literally have all of about 6 short verses on Saint Dismas in the entire Bible.

That will do it for me today, I just want to caution you about slick tongued preachers… no matter how “cool” they are, or how convincing and articulate they are. I pray for them, and you should too. Also continue to pray for Pope Francis. They had to put him on a breathing machine today.

God, continue to be with our Holy Father,  …your will be done. Amen

Be sure to check out  W W W dot SmAnderson Ranch dot com for all the SUPER cool Catholic Christian Custom Culture stuff that you never knew you needed until now. …and buy my shirt.

Remember, be kind to others, and try to be happy.

I’m the only one around here that should rightfully be called Sad Catholic.

Until next time.

-Sad