Thinking and Loving God

Apparently there are others who believe that the anti-intellecualism so rampant in some churches needs to be addressed. Piper's Desiring God conference this year is on that very subject. I'm going to see if I can't figure a way to attend.

Hat Tip to PJ Cockrell.

Illegal Border Crossing Facts

Rowland Croucher posted this here. This list puts things in perspective.

1. If you cross the North Korean Border illegally, you get 12 years hard labor
2. If you cross the Iranian Border illegally, you are detained Indefinitely
3. If you cross the Afghan Border illegally, You get shot
4. If you cross the Saudi Arabian Border illegally, you will be jailed
5. If you cross the Chinese Border illegally, you may never be heard from again
6. If you cross the Venezuelan Border illegally, you will be branded a
spy and your fate is sealed
7. If you cross the Cuban Border illegally, you will be thrown into political prison to rot
8. If you cross the U.S. Border illegally, you get…………………
1. A job
2. A Driver’s License
3. Social Security Card
4. Welfare
5. Food Stamps
6. Credit Cards
7. Subsidized Rent or a loan to buy a house
8. Free Education
9. Free Health Care
10. A Lobbyist in Washington
11. Billions of Dollars Worth of public documents printed in your language
12. And the right to carry your country’s flag while you protest that
you don’t get enough respect.

We Shouldn't Complain

A friend of mine is having a pretty rough go of it. He won't be specific about what's going on, but from what little he says I pray the Lord will give him the strength, insight and guidance he needs. Sunday he let some of his complaints be known publicly and he caused more damage than he realizes.

Well, this morning I found Randy Alcorn's new web site and came across an article about this very subject. Here are some of the reasons Randy gives for us not to complain.

7. To complain is to say God is not just.
“Shall not the Judge of all the Earth do right?” (Genesis 18:25)
8. Faith and prayer exclude complaining.
“I sought the Lord, and He answered me, and delivered me from all my fears” (Psalm 34:4).
9. This difficulty is being used by God for my good and it is foolish for me to complain against it.
“And we know that all things work together for the good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to His purpose” (Romans 8:28).
10. Those more faithful than I have suffered far worse than I, and did so without complaint.
“…and others were tortured, not accepting their release, in order that they might obtain a better resurrection; and others experienced mockings and scourgings, yes, also chains and imprisonment. They were stoned, they were sawn in two, they were tempted, they were put to death with the sword; they went about in sheepskins, in goatskins, being destitute, afflicted, ill-treated (men of whom the world was not worthy), wandering in deserts and mountains and caves and holes in the ground. All these, having gained approval through their faith…” (Hebrews 11:35-39)
11. Complaining denies that God’s grace is entirely sufficient.
“My grace is sufficient for you, for My strength is made perfect in weakness” (2 Corinthians 12:9).

There are a total of twelve of these but I thought these five summed up nicely why we shouldn't complain. I trust the Lord will take my friend out of his "funk" and put him on "higher ground" which is his normal operating mode. He is a great guy and I don't like to see him like this.

We all have complaints and it wouldn't hurt any of us to review this list.

Progressive Theology

I can't remember where I got this but it is appropriate for so much that goes on in "church" today.

How to Defeat Calvinism

James White posted this. I think it is funny. As a person who has recently found the Reformed faith (Calvinism to my Arminian Baptist Church friends) I might just memorize it.


As a "newbie" Calvinist I had to have some direction to insure I am what I perceive to be the meaning of "Oh! You're one of those," from some in my church. Thank God for His sovereignty. He supplied Jeff Foxworthy to help me out with this problem. Foxworthy says, "...you might be a Calvinist if your preacher says "turn to Obadiah" and you don't have to use the index..."

Bro. Jeff has supplied many more of these. They can be found here. And, for this link I want to thank The Wittenberg Door. He posted it so I could find it.

Fruit of the Spirit

I suppose its my age, but I have always believed that when scripture talks about "the fruit of the Spirit" it had to with a person and the effects He would work through us as humans. Although, unseen, He has always been believed, by me at least, to be just as real and important as the other members of the Trinity. As such I have always believed that to say frivolous, unkind, joking kinds of things about Him is not really a good idea. Somewhere I think I read something along the lines that by so doing one would not be forgiven. Apparently I got it all wrong. This Pastor? seems to think selling and promoting commercial products in His name is alright. After all, she say's she is promoting a healthy life-style. Here again my age is telling. I thought we were supposed to tell people about their lost condition under sin and the saving grace purchased by Jesus Christ on the cross. Anyway, watch the video and make up your own mind.


Hat Tip to Covenant Theology

Please Explain

Would someone be kind enough to explain to me why we adults (?) have gotten the mistaken concept that young children cannot possibly learn or memorize complex and intricate kinds of things, like, you know, uhhh, Spurgeons' catechism, and stuff. Is it because we're brain-dead ourselves? This little guy memorizes and mimics some very complex information for a toddler. My point? All kids should be learning very complex information as they learn to talk.

Spurgeon to his flock in 1858

Delivered on Sabbath Morning, February 28, 1858 by the REV. C. H. Spurgeon at the Music Hall, Royal Surrey Gardens.

When first it was my duty to occupy this pulpit, and preach in this hall, my congregation assumed the appearance of an irregular mass of persons collected from all the streets of this city to listen to the Word. I was then simply an evangelist, preaching to many who had not heard the Gospel before. By the grace of God, the most blessed change has taken place; and now, instead of having an irregular multitude gathered together, my congregation is as fixed as that of any minister in the whole city of London. I can from this pulpit observe the countenance of my friends, who have occupied the same places, as nearly as possible, for these many months; and I have the privilege and the pleasure of knowing that a very large proportion, certainly three-fourths of the persons who meet together here, are not persons who stray hither from curiosity, but are my regular and constant hearers. And observe, that my character also has been changed. From being an evangelist, it is now my business to become your pastor.(Continue Reading)

I know someone who should read this. He won't, but he should.

How To Win a War

I don't know who wrote this, a friend sent it to me. It is the best idea on how to win the War on Terror and gain control of our southern border.

----------------------------

I am over 60 and the Armed Forces thinks I'm too old to track down terrorists. You can't be older than 42 to join the military. They've got the whole thing backwards. Instead of sending 18-year olds off to fight, they ought to take us old guys. You shouldn't be able to join a military unit until you're at least 35.

For starters: Researchers say 18-year-olds think about sex every 10 seconds.  Old guys only think about sex a couple of times a day, leaving us more than 28,000 additional seconds per day to concentrate on the enemy.

Young guys haven't lived long enough to be cranky, and a cranky soldier is a dangerous soldier. 'My back hurts!  I can't sleep, I’m cold,  I'm tired and hungry' We are impatient and maybe letting us kill some one that desperately deserves it will make us feel better and shut us up for a  while.

An 18-year-old doesn't even like to get  up before 10 a.m. Old guys always get up early to pee so what the hell. Besides, like I said, 'I'm tired and can't sleep and since I'm already up, I may as well be up killing some fanatical you know what.... If  captured we couldn't spill the beans because we'd forget where we put them. In fact, name, rank, and serial number would be a real stretch.

Boot camp would be easier for old guys.  We're used to getting screamed and yelled at and we're used to soft food. We've also developed an appreciation for guns. We've been using them for years as an excuse to get out of the house, away from the screaming and yelling.

They could lighten up on the obstacle course however. I've been in combat and didn't see a single 20-foot wall with rope hanging over the side, nor did I ever do any pushups after completing basic training.

Actually, the running part is kind of a waste of energy, too. I've never seen anyone outrun a bullet.

An 18-year-old has the whole world ahead of him.. He's still learning to shave, to start up a conversation with a pretty girl.  He still hasn't figured out that a baseball cap has a brim to shade his eyes, not the back of his  head.

These are all great reasons to keep our kids at home to learn a little more about life before sending them off into harm's way.

Let us old guys track down those dirty rotten coward terrorists. The last thing an enemy would want to see is a couple of million angry old dudes with attitudes and automatic weapons who know that their best years are already behind them.

***How about recruiting Women over 50 ......with PMS !!! You think Men have attitudes !!! Ohhhhhhhhhhhh my Lord!!!  If nothing else, put them on border patrol.....we  will have it secured the first night.

Share this with your senior friends.

The Great Debate

I enjoy a good debate. Fortunately I do not live far from the next Great Debate series with Dr. James White. As of this moment I plan to attend each debate. The debates should be very interesting and educational. I live in an area populated by a very large number of Muslims. I don't know enough about their beliefs to carry on an intelligent conversation with them so perhaps after listening to the debates I will be better informed.

Here is some information on the Christians debaters:

Christian Debaters
Dr. James White is the director of Alpha and Omega Ministries, a Christian apologetics organization. He is the author of more than twenty books, a professor, an accomplished debater (having engaged in more than seventy-five moderated, public debates), and an elder of the Phoenix Reformed Baptist Church.

Professor David Wood is a teaching professor of philosophy at Fordham University, co-founder of Acts 17 Apologetics Ministry and a member of the Evangelical Philosophical Society. David, a former atheist, became a Christian after examining the historical evidence for Jesus’ resurrection. He has debated over 25 times with well-known Muslim scholars throughout the United States and England on behalf of “The Center for Religious Debate.”

Apologist Sam Shamoun is a writer and apologist for one of the world's most highly recognized apologetics website Answering Islam. Shamoun has written countless articles dealing with common issues in Christianity and Islam. He has engaged in debates nationwide as an informed apologist refuting the accusations and attacks presented by Islam against Christianity.

Spurgeon Said

So much for walking an aisle, saying a simple prayer, and being "guaranteed" of heaven by writing the day, date and time in the front of your Bible:

The works which are absolutely necessary are, in brief, these: First, there must be fruits meet for repentance, works of repentance. It is wrong to tell a man he must repent before he may trust Christ, but it is right to tell him that, having trusted Christ, it is not possible for him to remain impenitent. There never was in this world such a thing as an impenitent believer in Jesus Christ, and there never can be. Faith and repentance are born in a spiritual life together, and they grow up together. The moment a man believes he repents, and while he believes he both believes and repents, and until he shall have done with faith he will not have done with repenting. If thou hast believed, but hast never repented of thy sins, then beware of thy believing. If thou pretendest now to be a child of God, and if thou hast never clothed thyself in dust and ashes; if thou hast never hated the sins which once thou didst love: if thou dost not now hate them, and endeavour to be rid of them, if thou dost not humble thyself before God on account of them, as the Lord liveth, thou knowest nothing about saving faith, for faith puts a distance between us and sin; in a moment it leads us away from the distance between us and Christ; nearer to Christ, we are now far off from sin. But he that loves his sin, thinks little of his sin, goes into it with levity, talks of it sportively, speaks of sin as though it were a trifle, hath the faith of devils, but the faith of God's elect he never knew. True faith purges the soul, since the man now hunts after sin that he might find out the traitor that lurks within his nature; and though a believer is not perfect, yet the drift of faith is to make him perfect; and if it is faith to be perfected, the believer shall be perfected, and then shall he be caught up to dwell before the throne. Judge yourselves, my hearers. Have you brought forth the fruits of repentance? If not, your faith without them is dead.

This is interesting

Time Challies recently ran a poll asking what Bible translation people used for private study. The results are interesting. Of 2222 respondents over 64% use the English Standard Version. The King James Version is used by only 3%. Recently we had a seminar at my Church about the KJV and why it superior to the others. The presenter of the seminar had many apparently scholarly reasons why we should prefer the KJV. I believe most of his points were accurate and have decided that is the version I will stay with. Having said that, there are times when I use the ESV for various reasons. Anyway, here is Challies' chart (I hope he doesn't mind my posting it) and the link to his entire post. Click on the chart to enlarge it.

 Link to Tim Challies Article

Oh! Oh!

When I began using the Internet several years ago, I made a pact with myself in which I assumed anything I posted could be read by anyone in the world with access to a computer. Of course, I always read the privacy promises, etc., but I didn't really believe any of them human nature being what it is, and all. I was right. Wired Magazine now informs us that Facebook has reneged on it's privacy promises and is selling our profiles to whomever.

Facebook decided to turn “your” profile page into your identity online — figuring, rightly, that there’s money and power in being the place where people define themselves. But to do that, the folks at Facebook had to make sure that the information you give it was public.

So in December, with the help of newly hired Beltway privacy experts, it reneged on its privacy promises and made much of your profile information public by default. That includes the city that you live in, your name, your photo, the names of your friends and the causes you’ve signed onto.

This spring Facebook took that even further. All the items you list as things you like must become public and linked to public profile pages. If you don’t want them linked and made public, then you don’t get them — though Facebook nicely hangs onto them in its database in order to let advertisers target you.

Read More http://www.wired.com/epicenter/2010/05/facebook-rogue/#ixzz0nWsgdgPy

So, after I post this I'm going to close my Facebook account. There's nothing there I wouldn't let anyone read, but the idea that a company is so blatant about it's greed is aggravating.

I have to see this movie

Why didn't anyone tell me about this? I have to see it!


Kevin Bacon is one of my favorite actors.

Who Chooses Whom?

Who Chooses Whom in Salvation (from Mike Ratliff)

God wills                      John 1:12,13; Eph 1:5, Eph 1:11  

God draws                   John 6:44          

God grants                  John 6:55             

God calls                      1Thes 2:12; 2Thes 2:14; 2Tim 1:9; 1Pet 2:9 

God appoints               Acts 13:48; 1Thes 5:9            

God predestines           Rom 8:29; Eph 1:5, 11           

God prepares               Rom 9:23                          

God causes                  1Cor 1:30                             

God chooses                1Thes 1:4; 2Thes 2:13; Eph 1:4    

God purposes               Eph 1:11                          

God delivers and 
transfers                      Col 1:13               

God saves                    2Tim 1:9: Titus 3:5                            

God makes us alive        Eph 2:5                  

God pours out 
His Spirit                       Titus 3:6                  

God brings us forth        James 1:18


God justifies                  Rom 8:30; Titus 3:7                       

God sanctifies                1Thes 5:23                        

God glorifies                  Rom 8:3                        

The passages above summarize what Sacred Scripture teaches about God’s role in salvation. If you have taken an honest look at these passages then you have seen that God is the ‘first cause’ or initiator of a believer’s salvation. 

Unserious Atheism and Unserious Christianity

"Unserious atheism with its support of a sinful heart will ALWAYS trump unserious and unscriptural Christianity, because while both are silly, at least the former allows people to embrace the sin they enjoy."

More and more I hear good Christian people trying to motivate sinners from a human perspective to accept Christ and Christianity without much success. Scripture teaches we should acknowledge our fallen nature and in the light of our rebellion against a Holy God ask for and receive (repentance) forgiveness and acceptance by Christ. Scripture also teaches this can only be accomplished as God the Father draws us to Jesus Christ His son. (John 6:44).

What I hear so often, however, is that sinners should accept Christ and His free gift of salvation for various reasons all presented as something that as humans we should want. For example, I hear some say that we should accept Christ because we don't want to miss going to heaven. That is not the Gospel that is a sales pitch. One might as well be selling shoes, or a trip to Disney Land.

Selling heaven as the reason for accepting Christ is no different than telling people all they need to do to insure prosperity is to give more money to the church "because it works." The shallowness of this non-intellectual, mushy, thoughtless, presentation of Christianity will in the long run, in my opinion, convert more people to Atheism than it will to Christianity. In our culture we are taught to believe only in the "scientific" provable material Universe around us, not the someday, maybe, reward of an "unprovable" Heaven. To the unregenerate a Heaven someday is much less attractive than a new Cadillac is in the here and now. That's why so many are led astray by the prosperity "gospel."

What ever happened to Biblical idea that we should tell people they were made (not evolved) by a Holy God who, because of the rebellion of our first parents, has been rejected as imaginary and non-existent? That's what the Atheists would have us believe. The Bible says that if we tell people the truth of their rebellious nature, explaining to them how this has separated them from God, He will do all that is necessary to insure His chosen ones are with Him after death in the Heaven He has prepared. We can't "sell" or "convince" people of the idea they are doomed. Only the Holy God can do that. How did we move so far from the factual content of scripture that we now think we can "win souls" for Christ by our own efforts?

Why can't preachers just tell people the Truth of the Gospel and let God do what He is going to do?

Children, Bible, Family

My church is in the midst of a five day seminar about the Bible. We're learning how it came to be, the manuscripts used to assemble it, etc. I am learning some things I did not know, but that is the point isn't it? We all, even the teachers, can learn if we are open and willing.

Some in my church, even some in leadership, are neither open nor willing to learn. They have cemented thoughts they learned 30 years ago into idealized notions that the world around them has not changed. They believe "there is nothing new under the sun," or that even if there is they don't need to be familiar with it.

Their ideas seem to be the Bible hasn't changed, therefore there is no reason to change the way it is presented. The problem with this reasoning is, of course, that Satan changes his tactics on an almost daily basis. If we are not prepared as Christians to confront his innovations for attack we lose.

One of the areas of ministry that I see as lacking is in the teaching of children. It appears, at least to me, that this is now left almost entirely in the hands of the paid professionals. However, if those professionals see no need to "educate" the children in what they will confront in the world as they grow and develop all of our talk will have been for naught as the secular can quickly undermine the spiritual if we are not prepared.

We all know the statistics of Christian children returning from University as agnostics or even atheists so those stats must indicate a fundamental problem in the way we do things in the church. I believe, and have believed for some time, the problem lies in Christians parents allowing the busyness of our lives to override the necessity for parents to train their children in "way they should go." Here is an excerpt from an article which addresses this problem:

The average Christian receives an education from the Church that presumes that said Christian will never encounter someone with a different worldview or even one that is positively hostile. We educate our youth as though when they go to college their professors will be sympathetic to Christianity.

Now, in my view, spiritual formation is a duty that chiefly resides in the family with the parents being the primary mechanism by which the faith is transmitted from one generation to the next. Assisted and supported, of course, by the Greater Church. I think Church professionals have allowed too much to be delegated to them, willingly taking on duties that should be performed by the father and mother. They ought to work actively to restore parents to their rightful place in the chain.

However, at the same time I am a realist. Many parents don’t know that the Bible lists them as the primary medium for raising godly children. (Prov 22:6, Deu 6:7) They need to be told this, and then equipped for the task.

I'm not sure I see or hear anything on the church horizon to indicate a return to the Biblical notion that parents are to raise and educate their children. Too many seem to have been locked into the secular notion that the State has this responsibility therefore the church doesn't need to educate parents as to their responsibilities.

Personally, I'm enjoying the educational aspects of the "Bible Seminar" we are having, but I believe there are more pressing issues than telling people Origen used the wrong manuscripts. We should be having "seminars" on how to live in a world which hates Christianity and is getting more vocal about hating individual Christians. Who is teaching our children how to deal with these realities?

Instead of Bible Seminars how about Parental Seminars training parents how to train their children at home?

Shallow Gospel

John McArthur has this to say on a shallow gospel message:

"...A shallow gospel presentation that doesn’t present the reality of eternal judgment, the reality of the Law of God, the reality of condemnation, eternal hell, does not warn of God’s wrath, that does not crush the sinner under the weight of his violation of the Law of God, that does not make him stand before God guilty.

The gospel presentation that doesn’t do that isn’t a faithful gospel presentation. And then to tell someone, “Welcome to the family,” as if you knew; this is fantasy.

I've been trying to say the same thing for some time now, but no one listens. Maybe McArthur's voice saying the same thing will awaken those folks to the reality that a shallow gospel is truly a false gospel.

Watch this video to hear McArthur say it himself:

Doctrinal Relivancy

From Old Truth: Martyn Lloyd-Jones on Relevancy of Doctrine

How often do we hear it today, "Doctrine really isn't relevant for me; I need something that will help me with my struggles in life". Martyn Lloyd-Jones addressed that sentiment by saying: There is nothing which is so wrong, and so utterly false, as to fail to see the primary importance of true doctrine. Looking back over my experience as a pastor for some thirty-four years, I can testify without the slightest hesitation that the people I have found most frequently in trouble in their spiritual experience have been those who have lacked understanding. You cannot divorce these things. 

Much more here.