February 2012
22 posts
“One of the greatest strains in life is the strain of waiting for God.”
– Oswald Chambers, My Utmost for His Highest
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“If there are a million roads to hell, there’s not one road out. That in...”
– Leonard Ravenhill, The Judgment Seat of Christ.
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“There’s gonna be times where the Devil says “Why bother?” and...”
– Paraphrased from a sermon by Tyler Drost, shared at Refinery on 2/16/12. And people wonder why I love Tyler so much? This man is truly one of my closest confidants at Zion Bible College because he allows the Lord to use him far beyond his own capability. Tyler preached a sermon on Radical Faith,...
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“Godliness makes a nation great, but sin is a disgrace to any people.”
– Proverbs 14:34, NLT. Wake up America. Wake up.
Auston Jones: Why context is important for Bible... →
Such a good blog that everyone should read. Now. :)
austonjones:
Jeremiah 29:11 is a favorite of many people. It’s on encouraging cards, people get tattoos of it, and (I can’t confirm this) but I think this may be the only verse Joel Osteen has ever read.
The verse says “For I know the plans I have for you, declares the LORD, plans for welfare and not for evil, to give you a future and a...
“Hell is not fashionable, it doesn’t bring the money in. It doesn’t...”
– Leonard Ravenhill, Hell No Exits. Ravenhill is such a beast. Seriously. Listen to the sermon here.
Saint Valentine, His Day and Other Stuff.
You know what’s interesting about today? No one actually knows who this Saint Valentine fellow was. For one, there were over 14 Valentines all martyred in the name of Christ in ancient Rome. So, possibly, these martyred saints were all given this holiday as a respect for them. The second is the stories that come. Apparently, church tradition gives Valentine credit for marrying young...
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“5 For I consider that I am not at all inferior to the most eminent apostles. 6...”
– St. Paul. The Apostle. The Second Epistle to the Corinthians 11:5-15. No wonder the Gospel is so mocked in today’s world by “preachers”. No one looks at this section of Scripture.
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Healing? →
My wonderful fiancee and her strength in the spirit. God I love her.
candacerojas:
Today someone asked me “Candace you have been sick since you where a teenager how did you deal with everything? What made you become the person you are now? Before you didn’t want to go to physical therapy? they said where you depressed in a state of denial?
My response was being sick at a young…
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“God break my heart. Make me more like you. Make me love my brothers and sisters...”
– Prayer for 2/9/12
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Focus
I remember one thing when I first learned how to shoot. It was to aim for the direct center. If you aimed and you focused enough on the mechanisms, you would group in that center area everytime… So while the means may be different, our end result should be the same. The question is, are we too busy focusing on the means and aiming at other people’s? Or are we focused on that center...
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“Jesus, Use me. Fill me. Make me a vessel worth using and servant you can say...”
– A Prayer of Victory. A Prayer of Desperation.
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Love.
It’s interesting to look at my blog and realize despite all my posts, I’ve never talked about love. My favorite doctrine in Theology isn’t the Doctrines of Grace but the doctrines of love. It’s one rarely discussed because in the end, in Christianity, it is one rarely argued. When you ask people of Biblical knowledge to point out love, the Epistle to the Ephesians, 1...
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All the Gospel to All the World: There's More →
Tim Cruz’s message from this week’s Refinery! Really good message from timothycruz12:
There’s more
I was inspired by Jonathan miller with his tattoo, there’s more. It is hard to understand that God has more for us despite the everlasting situations that we may go through. Welcome to Zion! Home of the cold showers and million pages of reading. I…
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“The gift may be good, but the giver is evil. In this way, Satan and demons are...”
– Mark Driscoll, Death by Love
“Do we take time to stop and focus on what God might be saying to us?”
– Dr. George Cladis, Liberty Churches, Worcester, MA.
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Tale of the Tape
For those who don’t know, I love sports. I occasionally write tongue in cheek blogs about sports, and with the second greatest sporting event around the corner (the first being Curling at the Winter Olympics) I feel the need to go over the tale of the tape between the most important position in football.
The backup quarterback.
That’s right. The backup quarterback. The guy who holds...
Today in "I didn't know they were Black!!": Ludwig... →
Now that is what’s up.
thefoxxypoet:
theafrosistuh:
SOURCE
The true identity of Ludwig van Beethoven, long considered Europe’s greatest classical music composer. Said directly, Beethoven was a black man. Specifically, his mother was a Moor, that group of Muslim Northern Africans who conquered parts of Europe—making Spain their capital—for some 800 years.
In order to make such a...
January 2012
24 posts
“The Amish do not carry health insurance. The government respects their...”
– Cardinal-designate Timothy Dolan (New York)
“History is a God-ordained sequence of experiences in which man discloses his...”
– A. Berkeley Mickelsen
“Fear puts us in control. Trust puts God in control.”
– Dr. Fowler - Liberty University (via tterzek)
Calvinism, Free Will and the Lack of Understanding
Over the past few days, I’ve mulled over the idea of free will. Someone told me Calvin didn’t believe in free will and most Calvinists don’t either… What has come from this is research, prayer, thought and even my own standing on the doctrines of grace.
To me, the doctrines of grace are simple. Some define it as TULIP. That is, Total Depravity, Unconditional Election,...
Neutrality.
I can agree with this statement. While it’s important to have doctrine (See 1 John) it is more important to realize that we sometimes forget the importance of unity as Christians and whether it’s through joking (Ephesians 5:4, Proverbs 21:23) or through attacks (James 1:26) it’s not right…
And I am guilt of it all unfortunately.
teafortanisha:
This will be quick.
...
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“Those who read the Bible only from the perspective of their immediate personal...”
– Introduction to Biblical Interpretation, William Klein, Craig Blomberg, Robert Hubbard
“God, I don’t ask you to make my life easy but make me strong.”
– (via candacerojas)
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Gordon Fee, the Pentecostal Theologian
“Clearly Fee loves the Word, noting that heresies are creeping into the church because of lack of theological understanding and misinterpretation of Scripture. What’s needed, he emphasizes, is Spirit-filled living and sound scriptural interpretation. ‘If I could say one thing to the American church,’ he cautions, ‘it would be this: Keep integrity with Scripture and...
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“What has God been doing for two thousand years to lead his people into...”
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-Roger E. Olson, The Story of Christian Theology. An excellent book I recommend to anyone looking for a good read on how Theology has evolved over the past two millenniums.
Blasphemous thoughts
simplyorthodox:
Blasphemous thoughts are like airplanes that annoy us, against our will, with their noise, and we are powerless to prevent them. The heavy anti-aircraft battery is psalmody, because it is both prayer to Christ and disdain for the devil.
-From an Athonite Gerontikon
“Forty years of legalized abortion in our country is too long! There have been...”
– Archbishop Jose Gomez (Los Angeles)
“Often when we think of idols we think of wooden statues that people in far off...”
– Tullian Tchividjian (via tommartinello)
So true on so many levels antique-eyes:
Sometimes it feels so good to get something off your chest that you’ve kept buried for years, even if you start bawling your eyes out in the middle of Starbucks.
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Communion
So, beginning to do a study on communion and the thought I’ve come is how churches, whether Catholic or Protestant, all have this view that we should exclude people from taking part in Communion, that is the Lord’s Supper, Holy Eucharist, Divine Liturgy, the Mass, etc etc. Whatever one calls it, there is a certain aura of elitism around it. Such prerequisites of “pure...
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“If I’ve learned anything it is that we can never let the chaos and...”
– -Kalin Dreyer, Former South Africa WBC Pitcher and Atlanta Braves prospect.
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Football, Not Religion
45.1 million viewers tuned into the Giants-Packers last week. Realistically, this probably means there about 50-55 million watching the game. Why? Well, if you assume 45.1 million represents a household, and the majority of people watch sports with each other (there were 15-20 men in the men’s dorm watching one tv today) it’s safe to assume 5-10 million people were more than likely at...
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“Because no one is born into this world with a theology, each generation must...”
–
Mark Driscoll, Death by Love. First line of the book and already Driscoll hits the nail on the head. While many look at Driscoll as some kind of radical Calvinist (which I find funny because he doesn’t believe in Limited Atonement) there’s a point where you have to acknowledge what God...
Did Jesus Ever Smile? →
fathershane:
When you look carefully at the Gospels, you find a man with an obvious joie de vivre, a preacher who told funny stories to make a point, a leader who gave his disciples nicknames and a former carpenter who enjoyed a good joke. So why do we often think of Jesus as gloomy, and why do all those statues, paintings and mosaics portray him as downcast?
Read the rest.
Pray simply...
simplyorthodox:
Pray simply. Do not expect to find in your heart any remarkable gift of prayer. Consider yourself unworthy of it. Then you will find peace. Use the empty cold dryness of your prayer as food for your humility. Repeat constantly: I am not worthy; Lord, I am not worthy! But say it calmly, without agitation.
-St. Macarius of Optina
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We Need Religion!
Today happens to be the first day of my fourth semester in Bible College. This semester, as I struggle with my mortality, as my fiancee goes through chemotherapy, as my friends and enemies fall by my side, I’ve decided to make a commitment to blog at least once a week. Sometimes it’ll be interesting quotes or religious jokes, other times it’ll be serious blogs and on rare...
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December 2011
1 post
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Relinquish or Rebel?
Many times in life we stand at a crossroads in life that leaves us to wonder what to do. For those with independent streaks or others who meticulously plan things, when an authority denies us an opportunity we had been relying and planning out for months, it brings about two options in order to bring about that opportunity. The first option, relinquish, is that of an introverted man whom avoids...
November 2011
1 post
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October 2011
2 posts
7 tags
St. Thomas of Aquino
(This is an excerpt from a research article I am writing… Actually this is the conclusion of said article.)
St. Thomas of Aquino is an inspiration for all members of the clergy in Christendom. St. Thomas of Aquino didn’t let missteps stop him from being used by God. Even when his family attempted to kidnap him and stop him so that he can settle for being a Benedictine monk, he continued...
“The emergent church culture is trying to make Jesus sexy. The traditional church...”
– Paul Conway. (via xoxocarla)