Great rant, Dave! I too am sick to death of the "don't throw the baby out with the bathwater" line.

Every choice is an acceptance of one thing to the exclusion of another. Trying to walk between Yes and No is not only impossible but can drive a person insane.

Of course God speaks today! That is the only reason there are believers. God speaks through the Scriptures (the Holy Spirit applying the word of God to our hearts as only He can), and we can rely fully on the truth of the word.

"Impressions" felt in our hearts and "words from God" delivered by some supposed prophet are never reliable. How many silly and unBiblical rabit trails I was led down because my pastor had a "leading of the Spirit" to go this way or that; or because he was following some "prophetic" or "apostolic leading." The Bible became little more than a tool to illustrate and "prove" whatever "impressions" the leaders felt.

Yet some felt "led" to follow legalistic perfectionists like Torrey, while other leaders felt "led" to the opposite extreme of "easy believism." Trying to figure out which ones were right was impossible for sheep who had never been taught how to study the Scriptures. Both sides skillfully defended their "impressions" with Bible verses that supposedly "proved" their arguments, yet everyone knows they can't both be right. So what did we do? We sought our own personal "impression" or "word from God." Not knowing how to use the Bible, we would pray and agonize and gibber away in tongues waiting for God to speak to us.

And more often than not, we would interpret our lack of "getting a clear word" as evidence that we didn't have what it takes to hear from God. Right back to perfectionism again, in order to achieve whatever we lacked that kept us from "getting a word" for ourselves.

We're seeing that perfectionism rear it's ugly head again right here on the Highway, in thread after thread from new arrivals here that have not come to listen and learn anything, but who have an agenda of their own to straighten out us narrow, doctrinaire, lawless "low wattage" Christians. Of course the first step in doing that is to try to get us to deny Sola Scriptura, because as long as we insist on sticking to the Bible and only the Bible, they cannot persuade us to embrace their agenda.