Connecting the Dots
Who cares what you mean by eternal generation as long as you’re willing to affirm the language?
The question put to Ware & Grudem is whether they do or do not subscribe to Nicene orthodoxy. If yes, then recant the teaching that the Son is eternally submissive. If no, then say so, and come clean. And the simple argument is that the Nicene Creed’s teaching is logically incompatible with what they have publicly taught on the submission of the Son to the Father.
Congress is Nearly 98% Religious, Even More Than the U.S. At Large
Only 11 out of 535 current congressmen and congresswomen identify as religiously “unaffiliated” or refused to specify
Astonishingly the religiosity of Congress is considerably higher than America at large. Seventy-one percent of Americans describe themselves as Christian, according to Pew statistics. While significant, the proportion of Americans who identify as Christian remains nearly 20 percentage points lower than members of Congress. In particular, Catholicism and the four major Mainline traditions were overrepresented relative to the American population.
How Long Should I Preach?
3 principles that might help you answer this question in your particular context
Every preacher has been there. We can sense we are loosing our people and we still have 10 minutes left in the sermon. We want to make sure we give adequate time to the preaching of God’s word, but this principle to leave them longing for a bit more, is a good goal to pursue. I would rather leave my people in a place where they wanted just a little more, verses exasperating them with too much.
Dealing with Abusive Men
Psalm 129 speaks of those who are characterized by two words: murder and lies.
Too often we hear of men who are well-thought of in church. They know all of the right phrases, and know when to shed the right tears. They sing with gusto and say “Amen” at the right places in the sermon. But when they go home and are alone with their wives and children, they think only of destruction and murder. They systematically seek to destroy the image of God in their family. They are the king of the castle and smack their loved ones around just to make sure that they remember it. They belittle, despise and ridicule their wives. They beat and abuse their children.
Are Our Children Lost?
Is it biblically accurate to call children in a Christian home “lost?” A Reformed perspective says “no” based on Scripture’s teaching.
While I applaud many of Tripp’s helpful tips on Christian parenting, I think it is unhelpful and unbiblical to view our children as “lost.” Are they sinners who need Jesus like I do? Yes, for sure! But a healthy biblical and covenantal perspective won’t let us call our kids “lost;” we’re not missionaries to our kids. Like the Heidelberg Catechism (Q/A 74) says, “Infants, as well as adults are in God’s covenant and are his people. They, no less than adults, are promised the forgiveness of sins through Christ’s blood and the Holy Spirit who produces faith.” Our job is to teach them what it means to be a child of God: to repent, believe, and follow the Lord!
The National Geographic Transgender Cover Champions Child Abuse And Junk Science
Cross-dressing a young boy is emotional and psychological child abuse and should be stopped, not celebrated on the cover of magazines like National Geographic.
Studies have shown that childhood gender dysphoria does not inevitably continue into adulthood. An overwhelming 77 to 94 percent of gender dysphoric children do not become adults with gender dysphoria. Given this, it’s social, medical, and psychological malpractice to push young children to lop off or sew on body parts and take highly charged cross-sex hormones that can further destabilize their prepubescent bodies and minds, especially when they are highly likely to regret what grown adults pushed them into before they were able to sort through such life-altering decisions.
The Most Hurtful Comments of Job’s Friends?
What has hit me in reading Job in my devotions recently are the hurtful comments his friends make with respect to children.
Of all that Job lost, the deaths of his children had to be the most painful. Some may argue that in Satan coming a second time before God and asking to harm Job himself that his own health was most dear to him. No, that was Satan’s wicked, selfish logic (2:4) that any loving parent will tell you is untrue, for you would rather suffer yourself than see your own child suffer or die. Indeed, the gospel faith that Job had (19:25) is centered on the searing pain of the Father watching his own Son suffer and die. The loss of his children was Job’s greatest sorrow. The boils on his flesh and the bitter curse of his now child-deprived wife merely represent the awful pain of his loss.
A Child Abuse Scandal Is Coming For Pope Francis
In any case, on abuse, the justice dealt out by Müller's CDF seems to be too harsh for the pope and his allies.
Pope Francis and his cardinal allies have been known to interfere with CDF's judgments on abuse cases. This intervention has become so endemic to the system that cases of priestly abuse in Rome are now known to have two sets of distinctions. The first is guilty or innocent. The second is "with cardinal friends" or "without cardinal friends."
Inevitable Side Effects Of A Church Growth Ministry Model
When a church becomes preoccupied with “body growth” it becomes susceptible to a temptation to employ “cultural steroid enhancement.”
Let’s be clear. The Bible in general and the book of Acts in particular records and affirms the expected and desired dynamic of statistical growth in and through Gospel healthy churches… and so do we. But whenever statistical growth becomes the focused objective of a church’s ministry (instead of a valued consequence of its ministry), it is simply a... Continue Reading
Must Christianity Change Or Die? Yes – If That Change Is In A Conservative Direction
"Conservative Protestant theology, with its more literal view of the Bible, is a significant predictor of church growth while liberal theology leads to decline."
Episcopal bishop John Shelby Spong, author of Why Christianity Must Change or Die, was among those who argued that churches should become more liberal in order to survive. But Haskell says his research was definitive: “Conservative Protestant theology, with its more literal view of the Bible, is a significant predictor of church growth while liberal theology... Continue Reading