End time discussion – must see!!

If you have either never come across the various end-time views held by evangelical Christians or wonder what all the terms relating to the Millenial reign of Christ mean (pre-, post, and a-millenial), then this is a debate you really don’t want to miss.   John Piper moderates a vibrant discussion between 3 theologians, each of whom holds one of these positions, as they thrash about the reasons why they believe their view is correct, and what it actually means.   An absolutely fascinating and hugely informative debate and one I would urge anyone who has the slightest interest in what comes up ahead for God’s people to give your time to listen to this – it’s lengthy at just over 2 hours, but well worth every second!!

An Evening of Eschatology with John Piper.

 

 

Are you good enough to get into heaven yet not good enough to become a Christian??

Almost everyone who isn’t a Christian asked that question will say yes, but some Christians errantly also think they can answer the first part, in the positive not appreciating what that response implies.   It’s a touchy subject – “goodness”.  I have to confess I’ve not questioned some of my friends who wrongly think that they will have the right to enter heaven based purely and solely on how they’ve lived their lives here.

They tell me that they haven’t hurt anyone deliberately or murdered, or stolen anything much (always in comparison to someone else), or done anything “that” bad!! So what’s the big deal then? God is love – He loves everyone doesn’t He, so He couldn’t possibly consign anyone ‘good’ to hell could He??   Well, let’s think about that one.  How do you define goodness?  Where is the cutoff point between what is ‘good’ and what slides over into becoming ‘not good’?   What sins are ok and still allow you to contend you are “good” while others may not; stealing?, lying?,  adultery, pride, greed – the list is endless isn’t it once you start really thinking about it?

Let’s take a sample day in the life of a “good” person and try and apply God’s Law, which is the standard by which He judges all of us, to it.   They wake up in the morning, pull back the curtains, look out the window and see their neighbour has just bought an expensive new car of a model at least 6 ahead of the one they have, and immediately get insanely jealous and decide they don’t only want the same, but start planning how they can work to outdo them in some way and get an even better model – that’s the 10th commandment broken for starters.    Over breakfast they watch TV and get engrossed in a programme showing scantily clad people discussing the latest topic of interest, and their mind starts wandering about how their partner no longer attracts them, and how wonderful life would be if they met one of those on the TV and the type of relationship they might be able to pursue – there’s the 7th commandment broken, as Jesus stated that :  “But I say to you that whoever looks on a woman to lust after her has already committed adultery with her in his heart.” Matt 5:28 And don’t think that statement just applies to the guys, ladies!

The Christian Worldview 2009 Summit Essay Contest Winners!

Putting up a link for these 2 winners whose “letters to an aetheist” won them a Scholarship prize, as they state many of the primary arguments against a humanistic, evolutionary, worldview and reveal the error in logic that most who hold to that position have.   Certainly worth a read short as they are.

CONGRATULATIONS to the 2009 Summit Essay Contest Winners!

Do you want some water with your poison?…

When it comes to discerning truth these days, it would appear most so-called Christians prefer to have the poisonous drip of error and deception, without a hint of concern.  I shouldn’t judge perhaps, given I’m sure I would be just like them myself, had the Lord not rescued me out of a heretical church many years ago, and provided me with a desire to ensure I didn’t get duped so easily in the future.   But it is He and He alone who has granted me the desire and opportunity to seek Truth and to learn discernment, so I can understand why there are those who’ve not yet tasted that desire or sought it.

But seriously – I am shocked when I listen to some of the US so-called Pastors who appear to do nothing other than enjoy the fact that they have a captive audience each week to listen to their tales of their family life, movies they’ve watched, places they’ve visited, their opinions on all and sundry – in essence, pretty much everything but actual scripture or teaching.   They throw in an odd verse here and there to justify their title of Pastor, but pretty much the church members get a pep talk on how to live their lives better, how to manage their finances, how to view the future, and how to work their way to heaven by doing as many things as possible to please God.  Well, I’ve got news for them – it ain’t going to happen.   You can’t please God in any sense aside from how He has stated it in His Word i.e. by faith in Jesus alone for forgiveness of your sins.

Heb 11:6 But without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is and that He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him.

Back to work…

Bit of a longer break from writing than I’d expected to have this past couple of months, but a necessity of sorts, as I just haven’t been able to think straight much to do anything requiring brain power.   I’m battling bone pain nightly which is now under investigation but which continues in the meantime to cause me endless fatigue through broken sleep.   I’m contented it’s nothing serious as I’ve had this before in 2006 caused then by bony infarcts and it’s most likely just a recurrence, but I discovered then that the only way I was going to get pain relief was to be willing to be totally housebound and on ridiculous doses of narcotics which ended up just making my brain more like Swiss Cheese than it is already    So I figured this time, I’d just try and ride it out a bit more in the hope that either the Lord will once again heal as he did that year, or the docs find something easier treated perhaps.   There’s a possibility it may be nothing more difficult than bumping up my Vit D intake as I’ve had very low levels for some time now and my Rheumatologist thinks that also might be causing the pain as it can cause a condition called osteomalacia (bone softening).   But we’ll see.

So, in the meantime, I’m going to try and put my tired brain cells into action and resume writing once again – plenty of ideas certainly, but it’s proving tough to just get stuck in and put the post together – something I’m sure all bloggers feel now and again.   This is also the busiest time of year for me, as I’m once again starting in to the yearly Christmas Card production which takes up pretty much all of my spare time.   Usually have around 3-400 cards+ to produce and unless I keep on top of them, I end up in November trying to make 10 a day which is crazy – easier to make 1-2 a day now and have less pressure then.

But at least you’ll know if nothing’s happening over the next few weeks, what the reason is.

Short break…

For all of you who’re regular readers and those who’ve kindly enquired about my health of late, I’m taking a short break as I’m really not too well just now.   I’ve had a recurrence of the pain problem that beset me so heavily in 2006, only this time it’s progessed to both arms and is once again leaving me without much sleep every night.   No diagnosis or treatment is forthcoming, and so I have little choice but to rest in the Lord and seek His mercy for respite and relief.   To that end I’m going to a healing meeting this weekend, but know He may choose to not heal me miraculously (as He did last time), and so I’m opting out of undertaking anything much that requires me to think, as fatigue is overtaking me continually.

I will continue, however, to put notes together so that I can shortly restart writing again hopefully and bring you those issues I think we all need to be careful on how we view.

Thanks for your patience and I’ll catch you again hopefully in a month or two (or sooner if the Lord prevails!).

There IS proof God exists….

I truly believe you can prove God exists in multiple ways, but the best is in firstly accepting that the Bible is His Word to His creation, and thus obviously He will reveal Himself through it.   But aside from the obvious texts where God just states who He is, He has placed a lot of material in there to prove Himself to a sceptical world, and to those who at the very least, are willing to consider it.

The most important proof is still Creation.   I know many of you who read this blog subscribe to Darwin’s theories, but just stop and think laterally for once.   Aside from the unbelievable twists you have to take to provide any mechanism for getting from goo to a zoo let alone mankind, think about this.   If man had evolved from an ape no matter how many years it might have taken him to get intelligence (personally I think he’d have become extinct before it could have ever been a reality but anyway), after all that hard work and billions of years of evolving why,  but why would he then have determined he needed to create a god in any sense?   Would he not have figured he was a god to have come so far in his own journey of evolution -  it would have been a backward step to consider having any Being above him, let alone a God who would demand so much!???

A question for my Muslim readers…

I’m curious to know what Islamic belief truly is when it comes to the person of Jesus, because to me, it seems somewhat minimalist or indeed not something a lot of emphasis is placed on, in comparison to that of Mary.   I hear often about how Mary is just as revered in Islam as in Catholicism and that made me start questioning why, given that Islam doesn’t hold to much else of Christian teaching.

Mary with Jesus

Why is it that Islam places reverence on Mary (a fallen, sinful human being) to the point of agreeing with the Catholic Church that she was a “perpetual virgin” while ignoring the Deity of Jesus.    But more than that,  I also wanted to point out something I find odd in that respect.   If Mary is held in reverence because she gave birth to ’nothing more than’ a prophet (as Islam contends Jesus was), then why did God send an angel (Gabriel no less!) to give her the news (which Islam accepts)?  No other mother of a prophet in the history of the world ever had her child’s birth announced to her by an angel – not even Muhammed!!   Muhammed did indeed have a visit himself from apparently that very same angel  but only to provide him with a “new revelation.”    Jesus, on the other hand, didn’t need to have another visit from Gabriel after his birth because He IS the “new revelation” – but not only of scripture, rather of God Himself.   And why was there a particular significance about Jesus being born to a virgin if He was purely going to be a  only a prophet – the greatest prophets in the world before Him weren’t born to virgins so why is His birth so different, and necessarily so??

Isa 7:13 And he said, Hear ye now, O house of David; Is it a small thing for you to weary men, but will ye weary my God also? 14 Therefore the Lord himself shall give you a sign; Behold, a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel.

Whose life is it anyway??….

Have you ever stopped to consider your life – truly?   Have you thought about the awesome complexity of this “vehicle” you’ve been provided for your time on this planet?   Do you ever take pause to be grateful for the immense fact that you don’t have to think about it for 90% of your life or until some event makes you take notice of the air you’re breathing, or the number of times your heart is beating – things ordinarily we never have to contemplate as they work so well, we don’t notice.   And have you taken this one step further again to contemplate why you have been granted such an awesome body to reside within?  In other words, how often have you really thought about the meaning of YOUR life?! 

I’ve thought long and hard about my own many times – being disabled brings a whole raft of problems other than the obvious – aside from the not being able to live independently at times or not be able to do even the simplest of tasks, disabled Christians in particular then face the added burden of feeling useless in their walk with the Lord.   Many consider if they are unable to be active and “doing” then they’re not of value.   Now, I know that’s not true and I don’t believe it for my own situation, but, certainly I have had many times when I have felt pretty useless or inept in the work of the Kingdom.   When you live alone and don’t have much social interaction, you find yourself very quickly sliding into selfishness as you become so used to only ever thinking about yourself.

 He who has the Son has life; he who does not have the Son of God does not have life. 1Jn 5:12

Mark Driscoll critiques Joel Osteen….

I’m in no way a huge fan of Mark Driscoll, as I believe he goes way too far overboard in trying to appeal to his younger audiences and many of his sermons are on topics that should be kept private and not blasted out across the internet where those who’re young in the faith perhaps take them out of context and/or consider this is mainstream Christianity and then don’t know how to deal with the latter when they do meet it in other churches.

However, I came across this snippet of one of his sermons where he does a critique of Joel Osteen and have to say I was happily surprised at his viewpoint, as previously I thought he was little different.   Turns out he’s got a lot of very solid truth underpinning his radical approach, and so you really have to be hugely discerning to listen to him, and ensure you don’t get swept along on his tides of intermittent lapses of wisdom.  But his take on Osteen is certainly good and well stated – so if you’re a Joel fan, please, please take heed of what is said in this short clip and rethink your position because you will fall into a lot of traps otherwise and find yourself unable to figure out how to cope when you discover that God’s plan for you is most likely not for you to have “your best life now!!”  Not in the way Osteen states it at any rate.

Mark Driscoll on Joel Osteen