I first want to respond by saying that I think your idea of "searching for the truth as subjective" is mistaken.

I say that because those two things are contradictory to one another. The very definition of subjective does not allow for there to be truth. Truth must come attached to "objective," because that is the definition of truth. Now, I do agree with your statement that the search for truth is an individual search. Of course this is true! Each person is an individual who has been given individual libertarian free will (IE. Freedom of the will to act in whatever way they want whenever they want) and through this gift they are able to seek out truth. But subjectivity does not, and cannot, produce objectivity (truth) as that would be a contradiction. Now with this I want to state that I do believe in objective truth because it is pervasive in the world, the Universe, and is a common facet of Biblical teaching (I can expound on this if you want). Also, the soul as Christianity views it is not the Holy Spirit. The soul is the individual mind of the human being that is separate from the body. The Holy Spirit is the Spirit of God that He gives to human beings who receive His free gift of salvation by grace through Faith in Jesus Christ death and resurrection. To say God-given or not is to disregard a very important facet of each of those statements. If the individual soul is in fact God given, then that has several important implications on human beings. First off, if there is a God who gave us a soul and deemed that freedom of the will be a part of that soul, then said God would have also understood that the potential to act outside of whatever is good, as understood by the very definition of God Himself (perfect in goodness), would be possible. If God knew that, then it would logically follow that God would provide the means for each individual soul to understand how live a good life. If a soul acted in a way that is not in accordance with what God has deemed as a good life then it would also follow that God would place other individual souls into that persons life to try to motivate them to get back on the path of the good life. Is this limiting to the individual soul or is it actually freeing? Well, if God exists and has set that standard of goodness, then it is actually limiting to live outside of the good life because you are limiting your own ability to be truly (in the objective sense) happy and fulfilled. It only makes sense that the good life would produce a life that is lived to the fullest if, again, God exists. There are also several other points that need to made in regards to whether or not God exists for this to be applicable, but this is not what we are talking about currently. Now, if God does not exist, then it follows that freedom of the will is just an illusion and that every step made by man is predetermined because the laws of nature have dictated that they move in that way. Each choice was produced by Evolutionary stimuli for the benefit of the species only. There is no freedom of the will, truly, and there is nothing that can be limited. The soul, or individual, does not actually exist because they are simply physical beings living in a physical universe who will eventually physically die and cease to exist. This argument is irrelevant to those who believe this. The individual soul, if it is as subjective as you make it out to be, cannot come across objective truth either. There is no such thing as truth that is true for me in regards to subjectivity. Why? Because that is self-refuting. What that statement says is It is objectively true that there is a

truth that is only subjectively true for me. I agree with your statement about going forth with a questioning heart. Blind faith in anything is foolishness. But the common definition of openmindedness seems to actually denote intellectual laziness. Generally those who claim to be open-minded take many different worldviews, pick what they want to believe in from each, and do not question the truth claims of them and then go one to say that this is open-mindedness. I contend that open-mindedness is in fact taking everything in and sifting through the truth claims of each while understanding that only one of them can be true. Now, to the meat of the discussion. I do not believe that you can say that the Pastor of Mars Hill claimed He was right, they were wrong, no questions asked. That is an inference with no basis or evidence. Again, as I stated on Laurens post, we do not have both sides of the story and cannot, with any sort of reliability, even say that the letter is accurate in what it says. Anyways, I digress. You also have a radical misunderstanding of what Biblical faith is. Biblical faith is not what you subjectively believe about what Jesus said. Faith, according to Hebrews 11:1 is the confident assurance in what we hope for, which are the verbatim words of Jesus recorded in the Bible. No where will you find Jesus saying that people are to interpret in any way they want what He says. It is true that applications of the text will vary, that is the point of Hebrews 4:12, but there is only one interpretation of Biblical texts, not many. The Bible also makes objective truth claims all the time (See: John 14:6, John 17:7, 2 Timothy 3:16, 2 Peter 1:20, 3 John 3, Ephesians 4:32, 2 Thessalonians 2:10, 12, Romans 2:15, etc.). When you take the words of Jesus and interpret them, you have to interpret them in light of the rest of Scripture. The Bible was written to be taken as a whole, not as individual sayings (2 Timothy 3:16, 2 Peter 1:20, Hebrews 4:12, etc.). I do not believe that the Mars Hill Pastor limited Andrews soul in any way because he was trying to lead Andrew back to the good life based on what the Jesus he believes in said and did. Now, the entire Bible is also said to be the word of Jesus (because Jesus is God and God wrote the Bible; see John 1). And, since you are arguing from the Bible, this is in no way circular reasoning. As a side point, I am not talking about living a perfect life. What I am talking about is repentance which sets your mind on the mind of God and things of God. That is what the Pastor of Mars Hill was trying to get Andrew to do. He could see whether or not Andrew truly repented by looking to the Bible, the objectively true words of God, to see what true repentance looks like. If that was not see by the leadership team, that God put into place according to the Bible, then it would only make sense to remove him from the fellowship in order that he would not limit other peoples individual souls in regards to living the good life intended for all by God. Perfection was never what God wanted; obviously it is impossible to attain. He just wants a broken and contrite heart that is set after His own heart. Also, the Bible says exactly what you said; If I dont believe in Christianity, then it has no meaning to me etc. If you read the passage in 1 Corinthians 5, it clearly states that any sort of church discipline is only intended for those who have chosen, by process of freedom of the will (your individual soul idea), to submit to Jesus fully (and subsequently the Bible).

But you are wrong in saying that it has no impact on your soul, your life, or your fate. Jesus says that He is the only way to attain a relationship with God (which is what eternal life and heaven is all about_ and without Him there is no truth, no abundant life, no good life and no freedom (John 14:6). This cannot be paired with any other belief system as they contradict one another (per the law of non-contradiction). If you say you believe in Jesus, but then say that other paths can also lead to the same destination of a relationship with God, you are not only literally refuting your own argument, but you are also claiming something that said person you believe in would not have claimed Himself. I am not even saying that you believe in Jesus teaching OR believe what the Bible says, but regardless of that fact you cannot say that all paths lead to the same place. That equates to saying that all paths lead to no place because they all claim to be objectively the way and objectively true.