What Real Encouragement Looks Like Sometimes!

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Who would've thought that "encouraging each other in the Lord" would take the form of two hours of telling each other, "Yep, that crap's hard!"?

- A text I got from a friend after a long conversation about the trials we've been through, the heartaches we've known, and how difficult life can be sometimes.  It made me smile!

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Calvinist (Bad Logic) Comment #5: We Can Trust A Controlling God

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5.   A Calvinist says:   “That being said why would anyone trust in God who isn’t in control of all things that come to pass, the only way to have unreserved faith without doubt is to pray, hope and believe in God who is on the throne.” [My note:  Of course, all Christians believe that God is on the throne.  But what he means - what Calvinists mean - is "Why would anyone trust a God who isn't actively controlling all things?"  Like Calvinist James White basically says in this clip , we can supposedly trust and have faith only if we know that God is controlling ("causing") all those evil things, such as child rape.  But if they happen without God causing them, then they are supposedly meaningless evils and we would be left in despair knowing that meaningless evils can happen outside of God's "control." Umm ... yeah ... so instead it's SO MUCH BETTER to believe that we have a God who actively causes us to sin in ways He for...
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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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Spiritual Warfare: Satan's Schemes #8 (Deserts)

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(Reposted from something else I wrote, but it describes a big way Satan might try to attack or tempt us.  T his is long, but oh well. ) We're all going to go through "desert" times at some points in our lives - long, discouraging, spiritually-dry times when we see nothing happening and feel like God is far away, when our prayers seem to bounce off the ceiling and fall back down to us, unheard, unanswered.  And during these times, I think Satan would love nothing more than to get us to do two things: grumble and forget. When we read about the  Israelites wandering the desert after Moses rescued them from Egypt , i t seems that the two things they got in trouble for the most were grumbling about their circumstances (about God's care) and forgetting what God has done for them, what He's capable of doing for them, how He is big enough and faithful enough to handle their newest concerns. The Israelites had been through a time unlike any other in the history of mankind....
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Is It Too Late For America? I Think So.

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I hate to say it, but I agree with this article: "Crossing the Rubicon."   In fact, I was just thinking about this kind of stuff the other day, before I read this.  I know that because of all the chaos in the world right now, lots of Christians are praying that God would heal our land, our society. But I think it's too late for that. I think the march to the "end times" has started, and it can't be stopped.  I don't think this chaos in the world is necessarily God trying to turn us back to Him (but all the better if it does turn people toward Him), but I think it's about getting all the final pieces in place before Jesus returns. I don't think it's about pleading with God for mercy and healing right now.  Because I don't think He'll listen or change anything, as He did in Jeremiah's time (see "God Would Never Do That!  Or Would He? ).  I think it's about getting our final affairs in order, working as hard as we can ...
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How to Tell if a Church, Pastor, or Website is Calvinist (simplified version)

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(For the extended version of this post, which I recommend, click here .  It is loaded with lots more information.  This simplified one is just the highlights.  And feel free to copy this and share it with others, to help them learn to identify Calvinism when they see it.  Just make sure to share the link to this post so that they can find the original one if they want it.  Thank you.   New :  For the super-short version,   click here .   And FYI:  I found a couple times when the Calvinist author of an article I linked to changed the article after I linked to it.  So if an article doesn't seem to match what I said about it, it may be because they altered it. ) We just left our church of almost 20 years because of the dogmatic Calvinist pastor who recently came on board.  ( Read my "Letter to Our Elders Regarding Calvinism Growing in Our Church" here.)   And I was thinking about what precautions I might take to...
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Letter To Our Elders Regarding Calvinism Growing In Our Church

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Below is the letter my husband and I wrote to our elders regarding the Calvinism that's growing in our church .  I am including it here (omitting any identifying details) in case I need to share it with anyone in our church.  And I am posting it to help anyone else who might be disturbed about Calvinism growing in their church.   (Update: We have recently  left our Evangelical Free church , May 2019.  And the more I studied this issue, the more I think it  is  a HUGE issue.  One worth leaving your church over!)     [And if the elders and pastor get upset about this and start wondering "How could she do this!?!  And what should we do about her and the stuff she's writing?", I would suggest this:   The first thing you should really be asking yourself is "What if she's right?  What if Calvinism is wrong?  What is the Truth?"  And then take off the Calvinist glasses and spend a lot of time with the Bi...
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Juni Desiree's beautiful art and heart

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This is a section from a future post, which shows this painting I once did: This was my favorite one, the first one I painted like this.   And it graced my wall for a few years... until I gave it away to a dear online friend from Australia,  Juni Desiree  (we met online in the comment section of a blog she used to have).  It was the only way to say "thank you" for something amazing she did for me: dedicating to me a book she published of pictures she drew about her mental health journey.   Here's a YouTube video on it:  The Art of Mental Health: Book Launch!!!!  (at 5:04 you can see the "Dedication: For Heather" page"😊), and here's where you can buy it:  The Art of Mental Health Ebook - Etsy Australia .   Ironically, she never knew how very much it meant to me that she did this for me.  Because when she surprised me with a copy of the book and the dedication, I didn't have the heart to tell her that I was going through th...
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Spiritual Warfare: Sword of the Spirit 1

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[I intended to do a post like this later in a Spiritual Warfare series, but since it's relevant right now to someone I know ... and since it's been so long since I've added to this series... I'll publish it now.   Previous posts in this series are "My Story" ...  "Be strong in the Lord" ...  Spiritual Warfare sermons by Tony Evans ... "Stay on the Path" ... "Underestimating ourselves/overestimating Satan" ... "Overestimating ourselves/underestimating Satan" ...  #1 Satan's Schemes (unbelief, sin, fear) ... #2 (fear, psychics, prayer) ... #3 (vulnerable in good times) ... Spiritual Warfare: Resources ... #4 (vulnerable in bad times )... #5 (innocence, naivete) ... #6 (half-truths) ... #7 (bad theology) ... #8 (deserts) ... #9 (bitterness, unforgiveness) ... and (for fun)  "Scariest Halloween decoration ever?" I'll break this post up into several parts over the next several weeks.  Much of these posts wil...
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Help for Anxiety, Depression, and Suicidal Thoughts

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It's so sad to hear about all the celebrities who have recently committed suicide (or about anyone who has committed suicide, for that matter).  My heart breaks for them, for the pain they went through, and for the ones who love them, for the pain they are now going through.  It is truly a tragedy. To anyone who is hurting really badly, who is struggling with overwhelming anxiety or depression, who is considering taking their own lives ... I dedicate this post.  Please, take some time to look through some of the links here.  This is a round-up of some on-line resources or posts about dealing with anxiety or depression, particularly as a Christian. But first: Quick tips for help: If you are desperate for some immediate help and don't want to look through the links I have below, try some of these (or if it's really bad and you think you might hurt yourself, call 911 or go to the emergency room): 1.   Put on a worship song right now.  Or sin...
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So Chicken Sandwiches Hurt "Queer Kids" and Red Hats Are "Scary"!?!

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So, there's this article out (an opinion piece in the Toronto Star) about how "eating at Chick-fil-A will increase the suffering of queer kids."   And I say, " What? " First off, if chicken sandwiches have the power to hurt "queer" folk, then maybe those "queer" folks need to toughen up a bit.  Life is a lot more cruel than a chicken sandwich will ever be. And secondly, if chicken sandwiches from Chick-fil-A have the power to hurt queer people, it's only because the LGBTQ-community made it that way.   Guess what Chick-fil-A sandwiches used to be - before the LGBTQ-warmongers started freaking out about Chick-fil-A, before they turned chicken sandwiches into a political statement, before they started quivering, hyperventilating, and screaming at the top of their lungs about how hateful Chick-fil-A is?   Go ahead, take a guess?   That's right ... they were just chicken sandwiches .   And they would still be c...
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