Do you still believe the lie of Satan?

Perhaps without knowing it, you do.

It is John Paul II's assertion (DOMINUM ET VIVIFICANTEM) that most Christians still believe the lie of Satan to Eve, not really knowing what the lie is; missing it entirely. It is not "you will be like God" for we are made in the image of the invisible God, it is not "you will not die" because they did die after eating. No it was...

"knowning good and evil" - in other words, having the last word, deciding for oneself, being the final arbiter who submits to no man. I connect this to the sola scripturist for such an individual interprets scripture based on his knowledge and the written word, but reserves the final judgement to himself, believing he has the divine assistance to do so, and the divine assurance that he is right. Suffice to say, the evidence is clear; as there can be only one truth, not many, then the evidence is against the claim of the sola scripturist, in the following analysis.

if a sola scripturist is guided by the Holy Spirit, by definition he will agree with all others who are guided by the Holy Spirit with respect to the meaning of scripture. If he does not on a particular item, then it means one of two things: that either one and/or the other holder of differing positions is in error, or disagreement is permissible because it is a non-essential. In both cases, he has admitted that he is not being guided by the Holy Spirit, who only guides to truth.

The criteria for identifying essentials would be agreement, the evidence for non-essentials would be disagreement. No sola-scripturist camp can be disregarded in this division, since all claim the same premise. In the final analysis, virtually every established belief of Christiandom falls here, because there is a camp somewhere which rejects each and every bit of the faith. Jesus' divinity falls, the Trinity falls, the virgin birth falls, the resurection falls, it all goes away. There is one item of agreement. No Catholic Church & no pope.

Since all disagreeing parties claim the exact same justification for being right, then the inescapable conclusion is that there is no way to know if you are actually being directly guided by the Holy Spirit in your individual understanding of scripture. The result is that protestantism based on sola-scriptura and it's derivations provides no sure path to salvation; litterally there is nothing that can be known with certainty with regard to what is necessary for our eternal salvation.

pretty sad. What kind of faith is summed up only by a negative assertion?

Satan always wraps a lie in a vernier of truth, because the soul of man is drawn to truth, a reality which God built into us.