Basically, the main thing that caught my attention to keep reading about you and your work is what you wrote on the left column under “Theology and Steak?”…

“It is a Jesus Christ-centered blog from a person whose heart is burdened more and more by a need to evangeize those actually in the church.”

How that is music to my ears! I have been a Christian since I was 11 years old (now, 28), but only within the last 4 years has God blessed me by opening my eyes to a Truth I pretended to understand previously. Growing up, I attended a non-denominational Bible church until I went to college. My home church is strong in Reformed Theology and I miss it dearly. I attend an Assembly’s of God church currently, in another state, where my husband grew up (it’s his home church). I go through ups and downs of being okay attending this church. Sometimes I jokingly think, “hey, it’s not like I’m going to a Mormon church or anything.” But recently theology and historical and grammatical relevance in scripture has become more and more important to me. All of a sudden I feel this drive to shout at people “hey! come on now, let’s get back to the Bible! No more gimmicks!” The post-modern Christian is all about selling Christ rather than preaching the whole Truth that could be offensive to some (actually most?)!

All that to say, I appreciate your blog.

Delvy

Bob Hanks
http://www.bobhanks.wordpress.com

I ran across your site – by googling “the Jesus loves you gospel” – I don’t know if that is a term or not. Have been doing some reading here and admiring your work and your purpose, as I understand it.

I have done a lot of learning and expanding lately at a couple of other sites that yours reminds me of. They are – “living Waters.com” and “the way of the Master.com”. Maybe you know of them? These are excellent sites encouraging people with how to bring the Gospel to people and trying to correct the deceptions that have “crept in” (isn’t that the enemies way!) over the past century. They have a couple of publications that I think are related to the theme of your site. They are:

1) True & False Conversions and,
2) Hell’s Best Kept Secret.

Actually, I think that much of the themes of their ministry and yours are very similar and have the same heart felt concern for people that may be deceived. I would encourage you to check out their preaching and the resources that they have there – an absolute ton of them (free and for sale) and everything I have seen has been “dead on” (your concern as well).

In fact, your objectives seem so similar that you may even want to consider a link to help people that are attracted to your site. I would be interested if my understanding of you and your site does tie in with these other folks at LW and TWTM (Ray, Kirk and Todd) – they are based in CA. It may be helpful to your church ministry as well.

Like some of your other readers, I am not knowledgeable on some of the terminology that you use for your background. But I did recently learn what Arminiasm and Calvanism were (!) (I am learning all the time!) I don’t know what I am – probably an A. It seems to me that A’s can let C’s believe as they will, but that C’s would naturally have to be more concerned about the A’s beliefs?. Does that make sense? A lot of people don’t seem to know much about either , as I don’t know anything about some of your other terms.

I wonder how your daughter has made out with her diabetes over the years? Is this something young people can grow out of? I do hope that God has given you all, and especially her, all of the resources (from within and without) to deal with this.

I also admire your wife Karen for who you say she is. It is a blessed thing indeed to have a truly Godly wife.

In Christ Jesus,

Dave
(Northern Ontario, Canada)

Thanks for visiting. Please look around!

You make some interesting points, and I hope first of all that you will realize that I do consider myself a member of the church of Jesus Christ, the ones that Christ did for and that He redeemed. That church includes many members from all over the world, some who think like me and some who do not. That is a wonderful thing. While we do not all think alike, we all of the Church have one thing in common – the blood of Jesus for the forgiveness of sins.

As far as labels go, labels are part of life. They help to communicate to others our beliefs, practies, thoughts, and alliances, if you will. Labels are words, and they communicate meaning. Labels not only differentiate, but they also bond together. They are not bad in themselves, but they do separate and differentiate. That is not necessarily a bad thing. Grouping and differentiation is not necessarily a bad thing either. No one said the groups or “labels” are pitted against one another. They just help to define who we are so people understand us.

There are a lot of theological terms that are not in the Bible, but are derived from the Bible or Biblical or systematic theology. Trinity is not in the Bible, but it is taught from Genesis to Revelation. We use and develop terms outside the Bible to help us explain and define those concepts that are obviously taught in the Bible. Just because a word is not in the Bible doesn’t mean it is not Biblical.

I am not sure I understand your comment about Romans, or about the surprises. So instead of running off at the mouth with what I think you are saying, I would love to ask you for an explanation of what you mean.

Thanks again for visiting!

Brett

I have no idea where the title “Semi-Palagian Pentecostal” nor where the title “Reformed non-cessationist Calvinist” is found in the Holy Bible. Actually, I’ve never heard either term before. Why do you identify yourself like this? Thus separating yourself from those who are not of your theological ilk…who are learning to abandon the ‘natural man’ and come unto Christ? Why not just call yourself a member of the Church of Jesus Christ?

And as to accountability, you can try your best to ‘interpret’ Romans…but I think Jesus said it best and very clearly in Luke 12:48.

“But he that knew not, and did commit things worthy of stripes, shall be beaten with few stripes. For unto whomsoever much is given, of him shall be much required: and to whom men have committed much, of him they will ask the more.”

The two biggest surprises in the after life? Who will be in heaven, and who won’t be.

God bless through Christ.

What is the point to all of these quotes and propaganda? The more you look at and read this trash, the more you will unfortunately be convinced of their truth. Propaganda has a well-known and adverse affect on the mind, as shown by Hitler, Stalin, etc. I would concentrate you precious time to reading good stuff, the Bible, good books, etc and not this stuff that will pollute your mind. There will always be people who hate God, doubt God, and try and prove Him wrong or unreal. If you believe this, then don’t waste your time with me. Just believe what you want to and go on with your life. However, I would concentrate less on outlandish stuff like the above and more on wholesome truth.

Your quote above does not actually disprove the Bible, but reinforces its history. Sure there are flood stoies in other cultures. If the event happened, then wouldn’t there be similar stories? It can be shown, and has been over and over again, that most of the above has been copied from Judaism and not the other way around. God gave us his Word so that we would have the truth, and know for certain it was the truth.

Besides, Romans 2 specifically states that God put his laws (and the revelation of himself) in the hearts of his creation, so we all know God’s laws without being told or taught. A child of 2 knows right from wrong, what is fair, and what is mine. Who taught them this? No one; it was put in their mind by God as his creation.

That is why man has no excuse on the last day. No one will be able to stand before God and claim ignorance, because God put knowledge of himself and his laws in our hearts so that we DO know it. Yes, we know it. However, mankind as rebellious creatures suppresses that truth becasue the thought of a God that created us and holds us accountable is sickening to our pride and desire to do things our own way. Nonetheless we have no excuse. Don’t be surprised at what people say to get away from the idea of God. It’s all been done before, and is recorded in the earliest chapters of Genesis. It’s all the same old story from Satan, just packaged differently. Don’t be fooled. Pray for wisdom and discernment. And read something decent!

Read J.I. Packer’s Knowing God, What Jesus Demands from the World by John Piper, or the book of Romans and my series on it on this site. Dinesh D’Souza has a great book out now called What’s so Great About Christianity. Just some ideas.

Brett