Interesting items from the Interwebs, from all over the world.
Sunday, January 31, 2016
Saturday, January 30, 2016
Friday, January 29, 2016
Thursday, January 28, 2016
Bob Dylan all the songs the story behind every track / Philippe Margotin, Jean-Michel Guesdon.
Title: Bob Dylan all the songs the story behind every track / Philippe Margotin, Jean-Michel Guesdon.
Author: author Philippe Margotin
Publisher: New York Black Dog
To Fear God
"My daughter is a very wise young woman. She said she was troubled by the Biblical instruction to "fear" the Lord. She told me that if God is Love, isn't it CRAZY to fear LOVE? She asked, "As a father, do you want me to FEAR you?" Of course I don't, I desire to be loved and respected. So, what does the Bible really mean by Fear the Lord?
Greek and Hebrew words translated as "fear" in the Bible have several different meanings:
The Hebrew verb yare can mean "to fear, to respect, to reverence" and the Hebrew noun yirah "usually refers to the fear of God and is viewed as a positive quality. This fear acknowledges God's good intentions (Ex. 20:20) and makes a person receptive to wisdom and knowledge (Prov. 1:7; 9:10).
The Greek noun phobos can mean "reverential fear" of God, or a wholesome dread of displeasing Him. This is the type of positive, productive fear Luke describes in the early New Testament Church: "Then the churches throughout all Judea, Galilee, and Samaria had peace and were edified. And walking in the fear of the Lord and in the comfort of the Holy Spirit, they were multiplied" (Acts 9:31).
Our home was filled with love as we raised the children but we had rules like never touch the stove, don't cross the street without looking both ways, and don't stick anything into the electrical outlets. The consequences for those, among other things, were SEVERE and I got LOUD in what appeared to be anger. They FEARED ever doing those things again but I did not yell out of anger, I did it out of LOVE. That healthy fear of disobeying me, I hope was the beginning of wisdom for them. I believe the fear of God is the same."
- From Men's Online Bible Study
Wednesday, January 27, 2016
Tuesday, January 26, 2016
Monday, January 25, 2016
Sunday, January 24, 2016
Saturday, January 23, 2016
Friday, January 22, 2016
Thursday, January 21, 2016
Wednesday, January 20, 2016
Tuesday, January 19, 2016
Monday, January 18, 2016
Being Honest
"To be alive is to be broken, and to be broken is to stand in need of grace. Honesty keeps us in touch with our neediness and the truth that we are saved sinners."
- Brennan Manning
Sunday, January 17, 2016
Inclusive or Exclusive
From : John Michael Platanitis
INCLUSIVE/EXCLUSIVE LANGUAGE?
Jn 13:1 "Having loved His OWN who were in the world, He loved THEM to the end".
Eph 5:25 "Husbands love your wives, as Christ loved THE CHURCH and gave Himself up FOR her"
Jn 10:11 "The good shepherd lays down His life FOR the sheep".
Jn 14:21, 23 "He who loves Me will be loved by My Father. I too will love him"
Many professing believers argue against the explicitly taught scriptural truth of sovereign-grace, preferring the oft-refuted by scripture misnomer of "free-will salvation". They claim that passages like Jn 13:1; 15:21,23; Eph 5:25 are NOT exclusive passages, but merely "inclusive" ones.
An argument I often hear presented by them says "IF a man is said to love his child, does it necessarily follow that he loved ONLY his child? What about his friends? Spouse? Siblings? Same is true with the inclusive language, it is not intended to convey an either/or scenario." (They argue).
To be fair, I appreciate the attempt by them here. On the surface, it appears to have merit. However, under more careful scrutiny, I submit, it is easily refuted. Here is how and why:
I. Jn 13:1 does NOT say "He loved His disciples"; Nor does it say "He loved do and so". It says He loved "His OWN" - thus, EVERY person whom HE deemed His OWN, was included in that summary. Nothing more needs to be added, as it is a comprehensive statement. So when the subject is God incarnate and the object is "His own" that comprehensive language nullifies the afore-mentioned objection.
IF Jesus loved everyone, regardless of their relationship to/with Him, then Jn 13:1 tells us NOTHING of value by qualifying it with "His OWN". He loved all humanity, there was no need to single out a smaller group within the larger. For they are included in the larger. The caveat then is at best redundant and at worst meaningless! The ONLY relevant thing to say then is "Having loved all men, He loved them". This is NOT what John wrote.
If I love every other child the same way and to the same degree I love my own, then there is noting special, unique or intimate in my love FOR my own!
II. If Jesus loved/died FOR every descendant of Adam, then the caveat "He loved the church gave Himself FOR her", is likewise irrelevant in its particular emphasis.
- If a man dies FOR his wife AND also dies for every other woman, then there is nothing significant gained or expressed claiming "But he died FOR his wife"!
III. IF God loves and will love all humanity, regardless of their faith in, love of Jesus, then Jesus telling us God "WILL LOVE" those who believe in/love Him, is once again meaningless. If God loves me regardless of whether I believe in and love Christ, then telling me He "WILL love me if I do", tells me nothing of value. Nothing is therefore gained or added to me that was not already present anyway. In which case, the very incentive Jesus expressed, loses its incentive value and becomes practically speaking, meaningless.
May God give light
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Saturday, January 16, 2016
Friday, January 15, 2016
Thursday, January 14, 2016
Wednesday, January 13, 2016
Tuesday, January 12, 2016
Monday, January 11, 2016
Sunday, January 10, 2016
Philip Graham Ryken
"We are not justified, adopted, sanctified, or glorified without being united to Christ."
- Philip Graham Ryken
Saturday, January 9, 2016
Friday, January 8, 2016
Comfortable in the World
"Christians need to get comfortable with the idea that God does not intend for our earthly lives to be comfortable. This world is not our home, and we shouldn't waste time striving to make it more accommodating to our standards and morality. Nor should we be surprised or shocked by how this sin-ruined world operates, or how its citizens behave. In fairness, how else should we expect unrepentant sinners to act?
The solution to the world's rampant depravity is not political change. No election ever brought about true repentance and faith; no legislation ever transformed an eternal soul. And all the efforts believers put into forced morality and behavior modification don't help matters—at best, they're training new Pharisees.
There is hope for this doomed world. And while the church plays a key part in bringing that hope to lost and desperate sinners, it has nothing to do with forced morality, behavior modification, or political advocacy."
- Jeremiah Johnson on www.gty.org
Thursday, January 7, 2016
Wednesday, January 6, 2016
Reformed Theology
"It goes without saying that those in the Reformed Tradition hold to the doctrines of grace (the five points of Calvinism), man's helpless condition apart from Christ, the necessity of evangelism and the work of the Holy Spirit who (monergistically) quickens the dead to life through the preaching of the word as God turning their heart of stone to flesh, and opening their eyes to the excellencies of the gospel (uniting them to Christ). In other words, RT stresses the way the objective, written Word together with the inner, supernatural ministry of the Holy Spirit work together. For the Word without the illumination of the Holy Spirit remains a closed book. We (the church) cast forth the seed of the gospel and the Holy Spirit germinates it, so to speak, with the blood of Christ bringing forth life in people from every nation, tribe, language, and people (Rev 14:6). RT traces its historical and theological lineage back to the theology of Christ, Paul, Augustine and to the Protestant Reformation of the 16th Century."
- wwmonergism.com
Tuesday, January 5, 2016
Monday, January 4, 2016
Quote from John MacArthur
"A quick look at any newspaper, a passing glance at any weekly magazine reminds us that in our world the news is bad and getting worse. And what is happening on a large scale is only the multiplication of what is happening on an individual level, bad news. In fact, that has become a colloquialism in our time, bad news.
You see, men and women are in the grip of a terrifying power. And that power grips them deep inside their own being. And it pushes them to self-destruction. That power is sin, and sin makes for bad news. Just by way of capsulizing our thoughts about this, I see four major areas where sin produces bad news for the human race, and they're somewhat sequential. And I don't offer these as exhaustive or comprehensive, but just to provoke your thinking.
The first bad news that sin brings upon an individual is selfishness. It's bad news in human existence that every one of us is bent on fulfilling our own particular desires at any price. The basic element of sinfulness is the dominance of the I, the ego, the self. It all even began that way when Satan fell. He said, "I will ... I will ... I will ... I will ... I will," five times. Man has inherited this propensity with the coming of sin. He is utterly self-centered. He will do his own thing, if permitted. And whatever a society will permit, he will do. He will go as far as society's toleration will allow. Man will consume everything in sight on his own lust. He will consume things and he will consume people and he will consume himself. When a friend or a spouse or a lover or a family member ceases to provide what an individual wants, they are discarded like an old pair of shoes that are useless. We live in a world where people are demanding their rights. And this is nothing but the manifestation of what is deep in the heart of man, self-destructive selfishness. Everybody wants rights.
And the ultimate goal of life is to achieve self-satisfaction, self-satisfaction. Whether you're in business or marriage, or whether you're in love, man winds up perverting everything because of his selfish lust for gain, for fame, for dominance, for popularity, for money, for physical fulfillment. And so, sin pushes humanity into a selfish self-consumption. Somebody said we ought to use things and love people, but instead we love things and use people. The end of it is that man is unable to sustain a meaningful relationship. He's unable to really love. He's unwilling to give, and thus, he forfeits that which is the most obvious source of true joy, selflessness. Man becomes dominated by a selfish greed that alienates him from everyone and everything."
- John MacArthur
Sunday, January 3, 2016
Supremacy of Christ
"Everything lacking in us is given to us by Christ, everything sinful in us is imputed to Christ, and all judgement merited by us is borne by Christ." - Sinclair B. Furguson
Interesting quote from "The Martin Luther Collection: 15 Classic Works"
Hi – I'm reading "The Martin Luther Collection: 15 Classic Works" by Martin Luther and wanted to share this quote with you.
"The article of justification must be sounded in our ears incessantly because the frailty of our flesh will not permit us to take hold of it perfectly and to believe it with all our heart. The greeting of the Apostle is refreshing. Grace remits sin, and peace quiets the conscience. Sin and conscience torment us, but Christ has overcome these fiends now and forever. Only Christians possess this victorious knowledge given from above."
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Interesting quote from "The Power of Suffering: Strengthening Your Faith in the Refiner's Fire"
Hi – I'm reading "The Power of Suffering: Strengthening Your Faith in the Refiner's Fire" by John MacArthur Jr. and wanted to share this quote with you.
"One primary reason many believers today have a hard time accepting the role of suffering in their lives or in the lives of friends and loved ones is that they have failed to understand and accept the reality of divine sovereignty. Many also fail to see adversity from God's perspective. In so doing, they completely overlook the positive, strengthening, perfecting effect that trials are designed to have on believers' faith."
Start reading this book for free: http://amzn.to/1PFcLcy
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Read on the go for free – download Kindle for Android, iOS, PC, Mac and more
http://amzn.to/1r0LubW
In You
"And notice he says, "in you," that "He began a good work in you." It was an inside job that God performed in the depths of their souls, down deep in their inner person. We would say in their heart or in their spirit. It was not a superficial work that lay on the outside, or the perimeter of their life. God got through to them. And God did this good work in them just like He has in you. The preacher, it has been well said, can only bring the word of God to the ear. God must take it from the ear to the heart. God must bring it all the way home and do what only God can do. And whoever it was that brought the gospel to you, he could only bring it to your ears and no further. But as you reflect back upon your conversion, it was God who brought it from your ear all the way to the depths of your soul and began this new work within you. "If any man be in Christ, he is a new creature. The old things have passed away; and behold, new things have come."
- Steven J. Lawson
The Pastors Heart
Saturday, January 2, 2016
Systematic Theology
"Good systematic theology does not put God in a box; it clarifies the implications of what he has revealed of himself. Good systematic theology does not misrepresent Scripture; it is shaped by solid exegesis and narrative analysis. Good systematic theology does not idolize reason; it depends on revelation and points out the areas of mystery.
We all have a systematic theology. It is whatever conclusions, assumptions and frameworks we use to interpret the Bible and world. Those who resist the study of systematic theology do have a systematic theology – the problem is that it is unexamined, unconscious and unpredictable. The latter feature is troubling in ministry. When a minister does not pay attention to systematic theology, imagining that he merely reads the Bible, church members will find themselves subjected to an unpredictable ministry. Parts of the Bible will be exalted to paradigmatic status; others will be sidelined. Regular reading and preaching through the entire Bible will not alleviate this – the unexamined, intuitive systematic theology will shape and guide every step of exegesis and preaching. Unpredictability arises from keeping one's systematic theology a secret (from oneself and others)." (Peter Sanlon, 'Simply God')
Packer quote
J.I. Packer said, "Disregard the study of God, and you sentence yourself to stumble and blunder through life blindfolded, as it were, with no sense of direction and no understanding of what surrounds you."