Christmas in July #1

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This is one of the most beautiful Christmas songs out there.  And it deserves to be played all year.  It's so beautiful, it brings me to tears.  And I imagine that this is how heaven will sound ...

Christmas Canon by Trans-Siberian Orchestra. 

 (And for the equally-great, more rockin' version - Christmas Canon Rock. Oh my goodness, it makes my heart want to burst! Too much beauty!) 

Most Popular Posts of the Week:

Prayer, Faith, and God's Will

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(repost, summary of “Understanding God’s Will,” Question 9, Q9a -Q9i)             “‘Have faith in God,’ Jesus answered.   ‘I tell you the truth, if anyone says to this mountain, ‘Go, throw yourself into the sea,’ and does not doubt in his heart but believes that what he says will happen, it will be done for him.   Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours.’” ( Mark 11:22-24 )                    I have to be honest.   I struggle with this verse more than any other.   I really do.   I mean, it sounds pretty straightforward to me: believe that you’ll get what you ask for and you’ll get it.   Name it and claim it!   Sounds great!               But there’s a problem.            ...
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Links To Other Anti-Calvinism Posts

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Some of my thoughts and research on Calvinism (Why I believe it's not Scriptural!): Why is Calvinism So Dangerous? If Calvinism is true, then God is a liar! What's The Best Way To Make People Agree With Your Calvinist Views? Letter To Our Elders Regarding Calvinism Growing In Our Church Acts 13:48: Not As "Predestination" As It Sounds Sovereignty and Free-Will Working Together Anti-Calvinism Memes and Links Why Is It So Hard For Calvinists To Get Free From Calvinism? Can You Lose Your Salvation? Problems in John Calvin's  Institutes of the Christian Religion Are We Only Here For God's Glory? What About God's Love? So Job was a dimwit, huh? "Defend Your Calvinism" Challenge More Anti-Calvinism Memes.  Just for fun! Some of John Calvin's Contradicting Nonsense! How to tell if a Church, Pastor, or Website is Calvinist (extended version)  and the  (simplified version) You know what happens when you assume things!  A look at John Calvin...
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Updated: Alana L. 5L (misunderstood sovereignty)

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[I redid Point #5 and #6 in the Alana L. series on my other blog (and re-lettered the posts).  But instead of going back and changing the already-posted points on this blog, I'll just add the posts in their own little "series."]  Point #5 still :   L : "Sovereign, sovereign, sovereign, sovereign."   Misunderstood "sovereignty" You see, the thing is (and what most people fail to realize is) that Calvinists  incorrectly  make sovereignty about how God must  use  His authority and power, believing that He  must   always  be  using  His all-powerful authority  all the time  to  preplan ,  cause ,  contro l   everything , even sin and evil and unbelief,  "or else He's not a sovereign, omnipotent, in-control God." As  John MacArthur  says :  "... [God]  makes every decision that’s ever been made,   essentially, about everything....  He is the decider and ...
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Calvinist Bad Logic #16: Accepting Jesus?

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Bad Logic #16 :  In Calvinism, "accepting Jesus" is works.  They believe that God has to do everything for our salvation, even deciding who believes and who doesn't and causing the believers to believe, or else He's not really a "sovereign" God.  (Once again, it's all based on their faulty view of sovereignty.) And so they believe that we cannot "accept Jesus as Lord and Savior" because "accepting" is an action we do which would be us working for our salvation, instead of it being all God's doing.  According to them. And to get you to believe this, they accuse us - those who believe we decide whether to accept Jesus or not - of "taking credit for our salvation."  They mock us for acting like we "saved ourselves." But this is just manipulation!  Getting you to feel ashamed of the idea that we can accept Jesus as Lord and Savior. The fact is, the Bible is full of calls to believe in Jesus (which mean not...
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List of Calvinist Preachers, Authors, Theologians, Websites, etc.

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I  found a lot more names to add to my list of known Calvinists (found in my various  "How to Tell if a Church, Pastor, or Website is Calvinist"  posts).  But instead of adding this huge list to all those posts, I am going to put it here, and I'll just provide a link on those posts to this one.  [FYI: I added a note at the bottom of this post on May 5, 2021.] So here it is, a "master list" of known Calvinists to help you be careful and discerning about who you listen to and where you get your theology from.  There are plenty more Calvinists out there, but these are just the names that I ran across the most.   These are either definite, self-professed Calvinists or "most likely Calvinist," in my estimation.  (I haven't heard of most of them, but it's good to know their theology before I do.)   After finding these names in various places online, I looked up each person to see if they are Calvinist.  If they did not self-identify ...
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"The Last Goodbye" - A song for us Hobbits

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(a post from my other blog , from March 28, 2022) There's a song at the end of  The Battle of the Five Armies  (from the Hobbit trilogy) that's become one of my favorite songs.  I feel this song, especially the line about "Many places I have been, many sorrows I have seen..."  That's kinda been my last several years: many sorrows I have seen.   Many trials.  Many heartbreaks.  (Everyone who lives long enough will have many of these.) Most recently, I had the awful experience of being on the witness stand for three hours, giving testimony against my mom.  And after nearly a week of trial, she was found guilty of ... well, of something really bad.  (She insists she didn't do it, but we think otherwise.  It's not exactly like the prosecution says, but close enough.)  And now she will spend her life in prison.   Many sorrows I have seen. I don't know if I'll ever see her again.  The last memory I have of her cou...
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80+ Bible Verses for Spiritual Warfare (repost)

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Do you ever feel like Satan is beating you down ... with negative thoughts, temptations, trials, struggles, fears? Do you know that there is a weapon available to help you fight against him and his schemes? It is the Word of God! The Sword of the Spirit! But I just learned something about this  Sword of the Spirit  from Tony Evans.  According to the concordance, the actual meaning of the "Word of God" in this verse ( Ephesians 6:17 ) doesn't have to do with the whole Bible, the written Word of God.  It's about the spoken word, about speaking the Word of God, about using Scripture out-loud to battle the lies of the enemy. The power of this weapon is in speaking it, not just knowing about it or reading it or having a Bible on your shelf.  It's vocalizing specific verses about your particular struggle or temptation or fear or whatever ... to defeat the enemy and make him flee. Jesus did this when Satan was trying to tempt Him in the...
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My Testimony

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I've scattered bits of my story all over my blogs, but I’m gonna pull it all together here, about how I became a believer and some things I’ve gone through and how my faith has been affected.  (I’ll include links to posts where I explain things more fully.) Starting the journey:    I became a believer when I was eleven years old.    (I am now getting close to 50.   I don't know how that happened. )    At a Christian camp, on one of the last nights, they gave an altar call.    I wanted to go up but was nervous about standing up in front of everyone.    But being more nervous about the window of opportunity closing, I felt myself stand up and walk to the front.    I knew exactly what I was doing, that I was making a commitment for life.    And I meant it.    I really meant it.    I knelt down, asked Jesus into my heart, and have never turned back.    It hasn’t been an easy, carefr...
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How do you answer such Calvinist nonsense?

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Some of the things Calvinists say are such utter nonsense that you are left scratching your head, trying to figure out how to respond to someone who would say something so illogical.  (These are just a few that are on my mind right now.): 1.   Someone quoted a popular Calvinist (can't remember which one) who said something like this:  "We can't assume that God will give us something we don't pray for if it's something He's decided to give us only if we pray for it." And I say "Say what!?!" The thing is ... yes, I believe that there are things God has determined to give us only if we pray for them and that if we don't pray for them, we won't get them.  This is biblical. But I get to believe this because I believe in free-will, that we have the right and responsibility to make real choices that have a real effect on our lives, that God doesn't control every decision we make or cause us to do what we do, but that He lets u...
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Spiritual Warfare: Satan's Schemes #7 (Bad Theology)

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Happy New Year, Everyone!  Here's the next post in my Spiritual Warfare series .  I plan on eventually finishing it, but my posts will be fewer and farther between in the new year.  I'd like to take some time off to focus more on reading than writing.   Satanic Deception: Bad Theology In the previous post  in this series, we looked at how we could fall victim to Satan's half-truths.  And in this post, I want to look specifically - and briefly - at the idea of bad theology. Through Satan's influence, Adam and Eve began to view God and themselves incorrectly, which led to them acting wrongly and sinfully, and then spreading error to their children. And he tries to do the same with us.  And so i f we don't have a correct, biblical view of God and His Word (by spending regular time with God in His Word), we could be easily led astray, creating our own ideas of what God says and what He's like and what He wants from us.  And then we'll make decisi...
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