July 31, 2008
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“We believe that our Christian faith is a continuous perpetuation of a major miracle, the new birth. It is a vital and unique work of God in human nature. It is not reasoning yourself into a position, but something happening that cannot be explained; for what happens to a Christian can never be explained by a psychologist. In that great and terrible day there will be those white with shock when they find that they depended on a mental assent to Christianity instead of on a miracle of new birth.”
-A.W. Tozer
July 31, 2008
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This is a sermon given by Paul Washer Sunday July 27, 2008 at Grace Life Church of the Shoals (formerly First Baptist church of Muscle Shoals). Thanks to the kind folks at GLCS for letting me host this video here. You can buy the DVD, download the mp3, or buy the CD here (Biblical Manhood 2): http://www.gracelifeshoals.org/worship/worship/listen_online/service_archive
Also, their new website is fantastic.:
http://www.gracelifeshoals.org/
(HT: calvinistgirl for letting me know about this.)
Author: LaneCh
Keywords: manhood biblical servanthood slavery paul washer heart cry missionary jeff noblit anchored in truth
Added: July 31, 2008
July 31, 2008
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Noting my email inbox at Apprising Ministries it appears there are still questions and concerns about the article A Pastor’s Assessment of Richard Abanes. While answering an email from my friend Wes it occured to me that what I was explaining to him would actually help put this opinion piece back into its actual context. As a pastor I use Richard Abanes as a backdrop while I am mainly assessing the fruit of the Purpose Driven Life theology of Rick Warren, which is the root of this difference between Abanes and me.
Here I will remind people that the assessment article is really the finale to a couple of other pieces. This is what people just coming into this situation don’t know. In 2005 when I ended up having to write this opinion piece defending myself from Richard’s initial attack on me AM had only been online for a few days. I kid you not. Apprising Ministries had only come online around August 27, 2005.
So here is the link to my first time ever response to Richard Abanes who had for some reason decided he needed to single my little web site out. The assessment piece people are discussing is actually a response to Richard’s critque of the artcle I now point you to. Unfortunately his other web site, which I refer to in this piece was later deleted so I apologize that my links to his material cited are not available anymore.
July 31, 2008
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Noting my email inbox at Apprising Ministries it appears there are still questions and concerns about the article A Pastor’s Assessment of Richard Abanes. While answering an email from my friend Wes it occured to me that what I was explaining to him would actually help put this opinion piece back into its actual context. As a pastor I use Richard Abanes as a backdrop while I am mainly assessing the fruit of the Purpose Driven Life theology of Rick Warren, which is the root of this difference between Abanes and me.
Here I will remind people that the assessment article is really the finale to a couple of other pieces. This is what people just coming into this situation don’t know. In 2005 when I ended up having to write this opinion piece defending myself from Richard’s initial attack on me AM had only been online for a few days. I kid you not. Apprising Ministries had only come online around August 27, 2005.
So here is the link to my first time ever response to Richard Abanes who had for some reason decided he needed to single my little web site out. The assessment piece people are discussing is actually a response to Richard’s critque of the artcle I now point you to. Unfortunately his other web site, which I refer to in this piece was later deleted so I apologize that my links to his material cited are not available anymore.
July 31, 2008
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The main point of 2 Peter 1 which everything else supports or elaborates is verse 10: “Brethren, be the more zealous to confirm your call and election; for if you do this, you will never fall.” Peter wants us to enjoy the certainty of our salvation. He wants us to be so firmly established in God that we cannot be shaken by any temptation or false teaching. In 3:17 he draws his letter to a close with this admonition: “Beware lest you be carried away with the error of lawless men and lose your own stability.” Peter devotes his last will and testament (1:14, 15) to help us be firm and stable and unshakable in our faith.
(click here to read this post)
July 31, 2008
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Wow! Watch this video of Todd Bentley explaining ‘his idea’ regarding ‘his definition’ of the Gospel. Pay VERY close attention because his reasoning and his argument are ALMOST verbatim what Brian McLaren and the Emergents are saying about the Gospel. The similarities are down right creeeeeepy.
Todd Bentley says that “The Gospel is not mere talking it means the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand. (meaning signs and wornders).
Emergents say that “The Gospel is not mere talking it means the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand. (meaning bringing justice and equality to the poor and the marginalized)
But notice that neither of those definitions of the Gospel is how the Bible defines the gospel. Again, God’s Word gives a clear and concise defintion of the Gospel in 1 Corinthians 15:1:1-4
1Cor. 15:1 Now I would remind you, brothers, of the gospel I preached to you, which you received, in which you stand, 2 and by which you are being saved, if you hold fast to the word I preached to you—unless you believed in vain.
1Cor. 15:3 For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures, 4 that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures
Also, the Bible is brutally clear regarding those who teach ‘another gospel’ or ‘distort the gospel’.
Gal. 1:6 I am astonished that you are so quickly deserting him who called you in the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel— 7 not that there is another one, but there are some who trouble you and want to distort the gospel of Christ. 8 But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach to you a gospel contrary to the one we preached to you, let him be accursed. 9 As we have said before, so now I say again: If anyone is preaching to you a gospel contrary to the one you received, let him be accursed.
The similarities between Todd Bentley’s false gospel and the false gospel of the emergents are too close to be mere coincidence. We bet they got their gospels from the same spirit and it wasn’t the Holy Spirit.
July 31, 2008
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It is often said that there is nothing like a major sporting event on a Sunday to separate the sheep from the goats. On Super Bowl Sunday, church attendance drops as people reveal who their God is.
In England, it’s not much different, except it is soccer that has long been an idol, and today in Manchester, England, I had the displeasure of hearing hundreds of Manchester United soccer fans chanting:
“What a friend we have in Jesus,” and then they continued “and his name is Cantona.” (an ex-player)
Hearing hundreds boldly blaspheming Christ on the streets where I live broke my heart, but when I realised on match day’s there are up to 76,000 people in a stadium doing this, it was crushing.
But another thing struck my mind. Whilst I expect unbelievers to act like unbelievers. Why is it that when I heard just a few hundred fans singing blasphemies I found it heart breaking. Yet there are many professing Christians who pay a fortune to listen to that, and more, each week with their children, and do not seem in the least bit disturbed by it?
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July 31, 2008
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Steve Camp has posted on battles among professing Christians in the blogosphere. Steve writes:
“So how should conflict about message and messenger biblically be handled in the blogosphere? Here are a few thoughts that I hope will prove helpful and be an encouragement to you.”
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July 31, 2008
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July 31, 2008
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Over at Camp On This Steve Camp writes:
When we are wronged, spoken falsely about, our character maligned and reputation smudged, how should we as Christians respond? What does the Word of God teach about this, especially when it comes to the arena of blogging?
There has been an issue of late where…, Ken Silva, and his website were forced to go dark because of one complaint lodged against him by another blogger. This other blogger claimed he was slandered by Ken; IMHO, after reading all the documents I could find, he wasn’t. This other blogger made a few mistakes: he never contacted Ken directly; he did not follow biblical guidelines for resolve; and he tried to deal with this by reporting Ken to an easily intimated web hosting company of his blog. The next thing you know, Ken’s site is gone – sent to electron heaven…
July 31, 2008
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Ingrid continues her series, Inherit the Wind: When Men Hurt Their Own with Part 2. She addresses the destruction of domestic abuse in Christian homes.
The first installment received a number of responses, including one from a Christian husband who repented of his treatment of his wife, and several from women who either went through it or have loved ones who currently are.
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July 31, 2008
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(NOTE: If you’re pressed for time, scroll to timestamp 8:30. That’s where the message really picks up.)
This is a message by Pastor Jim McClarty. Pastor McClarty runs the great website http://www.SalvationbyGrace.org . There he has a very thorough QandA section that deals with many questions that are brought against the Reformed faith. You can access that here: http://www.salvationbygrace.org/default.aspx?ct=sub/qa I’ve learned a lot from his ministry and highly recommend it. This is a message that’s entitled “The Best News You Ever Heard”. It is a WONDERFUL sermon that would be great to share with an unbeliever and a believer alike. I heard this several months ago and asked Pastor McClarty if I could host it here to share with you all. Of course, he was happy to oblige. I believe you will be edified if you take the time to listen to this sermon in its entirety.
This was given at the Sovereign Grace Bible Conference last year (2007). Here’s information about this year’s conference:
http://www.sovereigngracebibleconference.org/
http://www.salvationbygrace.org
Author: LaneCh
Keywords: total depravity gospel good news jim mcclarty salvation by grace conference calvinism reformed
Added: July 31, 2008
July 31, 2008
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Emergent followers of men like Brian McLaren and Rob Bell are completely ‘rethinking’ the Gospel and what it means to be a Christian. Ironically, their newly “rethunk” “gospel” has no Biblical foundation or backing.
Here is an example of one emergent type waxing eloquent about the ‘wideness in God’s mercy. He parrots McLaren’s “new” explanation for Jesus’ death on the cross (that Jesus died to show us the brutality of imperial framing stories.) Said Chad the Emergent Type:
The proclamation that Jesus is Lord led those who were maligned with the name “Christian” to stop at nothing, including death, to spread the Good News that death has lost its sting in Christ Jesus and because of this Rome can no longer carve up the world with their greatest weapon – fear of the sword. Now, free to live fully in the present (the Kingdom of God being at hand), we can reach out to the poor, the homeless, the oppressed, the widow, the orphan and the marginalized, and even we lowly Gentiles, to announce that Justice will be served – but until that day we strive as fellow workers with God and pray thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.
This is emergent gobbledygook that contradicts the Biblical Gospel.
The Apostle Paul, under the inspiration of God the Holy Spirit, clearly and concisely defined The Gospel for us. His clear and concise definition is found in 1 Corinthians 15:1-4 which states:
1Cor. 15:1 Now I would remind you, brothers, of the gospel I preached to you, which you received, in which you stand, 2 and by which you are being saved, if you hold fast to the word I preached to you—unless you believed in vain.
1Cor. 15:3 For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures, 4 that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures
The Good News (gospel), according to the Bible, is the proclamation that Jesus Christ died for our sins and the certainty of this forgiveness by Christ’s resurrection from the grave. The gospel has nothing to do with telling the Romans they can’t carve up the world with the fear of the sword.
Instead, the Biblical Gospel tell us the Good News that God is offering all sinners a full and complete pardon of their sins through the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. This ‘other gospel’ that emergent types are pushing on us sounds loving because of its talk of reaching out to the poor and the marginalized. Unfortunately, they are reaching them with a false gospel. Here is what the scriptures say about the true Christian gospel and true Christian ministry:
2 Cor 5:17 Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation.The old has passed away; behold, the new has come. 18 All this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation; 19 that is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting to us the message of reconciliation. 20 Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, God making his appeal through us. We implore you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. 21 For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.
This passage clearly states that the Good News is the message that in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself by not counting men’s sins against them. In other words, the proclamation of the Kingdom of God IS the proclamation of a Kingdom grounded in the forgiveness of sins won by Jesus Christ’s Penal Substitutionary Atonement. In fact, the mercy of Christ’s death on the cross is so wide that all whom God turns in repentance and gives faith to believe this Good News will be saved.
July 31, 2008
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For those who may have missed it as they try and sort through the wreckage of this most unfortunate incident where accusations by Richard Abanes, whose pastor is Rick Warren, did lead to the termination of the old Apprising Ministries website I have given my summation of what actually happened in “Just the Facts” About Richard Abanes and the old Apprising Ministries Website.
Now for those who have not liked reading about this issue, 1) no one forced you to, and 2) I would ask them to consider how they might have liked to be the one who had to live through it. As a pastor I must tell you that things like this will only be increasing because from where I stand the evangelicalism, which men like Richard Abanes hold dear, is just as apostate overall as the Church of Rome was in Luther’s day.
The truth is if you have a weak heart for relatively minor conflicts such as this one between Abanes and me then I exhort you in the Lord to ask God to strengthen you. You need to know that you will be seeing 1 Peter 4:17 judgments coming upon the American Christian Church. So if you thought this little one was ugly how will you ever stand when we really begin defending and fighting for the purity of the actual Gospel of Jesus Christ to rescue it from the myriad counterfeit “Christians” running around the landscape.
You would do well to go and ask the Lord to show you what I am talking about because I assure you that I am hardly alone in what I’ve said. However, I’m not looking for public reinforcments anytime soon. And my final point in the sad saga of Richard Abanes will be to correct something I have seen him say all over the Internet:
“how about the wishes of the ISP who had discovered, thanks to my alert, that Silva had violated their TOS with them.”
For the record: There is zero evidence that IPower actually investigated the false accusation by Richard Abanes. And it remains false because it has never been proven. Things are not slander/libel simply because a given individual claims that they are.
And I have never, ever been supplied–by either party–any specifics concerning this alleged slander, etc. within my opinion piece A PASTOR’S ASSESSMENT OF RICHARD ABANES. Also, I have never spoken privately with Richard Abanes at any time.
This is not the forum to argue this any further so I am only going to say: Richard Abanes is most certainly welcome to his opinion but I really think it would be more Christian of him if he would not to continue to spread this particular piece of misinformation.
July 31, 2008
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These wonderful quotes on prayer have both blessed me and challenged me in the last week (more quotes on the links):
James Hudson Taylor: “Do not have your concert first, and then tune your instrument afterwards. Begin the day with the Word of God and prayer, and get first of all into harmony with Him.”- from James Hudson Taylor – Powerful Prayer Quotes”.
Paul Washer on worthless prayer Meetings: “Most prayer meetings are absolutely worthless. So that I’m really clear, most prayer meetings are absolutely worthless. First of all because they are like town meetings. They spend 20 minutes telling people news… it’s almost like a town gossip session…
Don’t even think about the hypocritical thing that goes on in churches today, in which you stand up, and you share with people a need that you’ve never even prayed about. How many times have you done that? You share a need and you haven’t even prayed about it. You’re not burdened about it...” Click here to listen to the 6 min audio
Andrew A Bonar: “We have not been men of prayer. The spirit of prayer has slumbered among us. The closet has been too little frequented and delighted in. We have allowed business, study or active labor to interfere with our closet-hours. And the feverish atmosphere in which both the church and the nation are enveloped has found its way into our prayer closets…” from: Andrew A Bonar – Quotes on Prayer.
Keith Green: If your heart takes more pleasure in reading novels, or watching TV, or going to the movies, or talking to friends, rather than just sitting alone with God and embracing Him, sharing His cares and His burdens, weeping and rejoicing with Him, then how are you going to handle forever and ever in His presence…? You’d be bored to tears in heaven, if you’re not ecstatic about God now!” Puritan Fellowship.
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July 31, 2008
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Earlier today, I shared this testimony with Ingrid and she recommended posting it here to share with all of you. This is a testimony of a very close friend of mine, Susan Yenser. Susan gave this recently at an FCA meeting at the University of Florida where she plays on the women’s basketball team. She’s one of the few people that I can say with all honesty that I’m a better person for knowing. Her testimony is one that many believers can relate to. On the outside, she was “Christian”, but on the inside, her heart had never really been dealt with first hand by God until a few years ago. She unburdened her heart to the FCA that night and shared with them that much of the “cultural Christianity” that’s trying to pass itself off today as being legitimate is actually making people hardened to the true Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ. Not only that, but she breaks the stereotype that says that someone her age and involved in her sort of activities wants to be entertained instead of taught the sound doctrine of the Christian faith. She’s one of the few who fit that “niche demographic” that the “seeker” gurus are so fixated on that has finally had the courage to stand up to say, “Enough.”
Susan’s Blog
Susan’s Youtube Channel
More Information About Susan
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July 31, 2008
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Here’s the latest Crosstalk America video. This deals with the recent 2008 Inspiring Excellence Conference which Ingrid attended. She gives her review of it in this episode. You may download the entire message on mp3 here or listen to it in various other formats there as well.
Crosstalk America’s Official Youtube Channel
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July 31, 2008
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HT: Thoughts On The Way.
“The fact is that the world expects us to be different; and this idea that you can win the world by showing that after all you are very similar to it, with scarcely any difference at all, or but a very slight one, is basically wrong not only theologically but even psychologically. Our Lord attracted sinners because He was different. They drew near to Him because they felt that there was something different about Him… this idea that you are going to win people to the Christian faith by showing them that after all you are remarkably like them, is theologically and psychologically a profound blunder. In this realm we are dealing with God, and our knowledge of God, and our relationship to God. So everything here must be ‘under God’ and must be done ‘with reverence and godly fear’. We do not decide this; we are not in charge and in control, it is God. It is His service, and He has to be approached ‘with reverence and with godly fear, because our God is a consuming fire’….light entertainment, easy familiarity and jocularity are not compatible with a realisation of the seriousness of the condition of the souls of all men by nature, the fact that they are lost and in danger of eternal perdition, and their consequent need of salvation.”
-D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones, Preaching and Preachers, 139-140
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July 31, 2008
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Is Jesus Christ supremely valuable to you? Or is he just a ticket to heaven?
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“We believe that our Christian faith is a continuous perpetuation of a major miracle, the new birth. It is a vital and unique work of God in human nature. It is not reasoning yourself into a position, but something happening that cannot be explained; for what happens to a Christian can never be explained by a psychologist. In that great and terrible day there will be those white with shock when they find that they depended on a mental assent to Christianity instead of on a miracle of new birth.”
