Finally! Someone In Hollywood Stops Apologizing!

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So glad to see this finally happen: A celebrity has finally stood up and said that enough is enough, that they are not going to apologize to the mobs who constantly attack others to bend them to their twisted political agendas.

 Way to go, Kevin Hart!  Good to see that commonsense still lives and that some people still have a backbone!

 The more people apologize to these mobs and try to appease them, the more powerful and power-hunger they get.  There's a lot that we need to stop apologizing for, before we end up giving them total control over social customs and values and what's allowed and what's not allowed.

 The madness will only end when people do just what Kevin Hart did: stop apologizing, and stop letting them make you feel like you have something to apologize for!

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No Masks Allowed!

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           I’ve talked before about the need to get real with God.   But I think that we Christians also need to do better at being real with each other.   Why can’t we Christians just admit that we are broken, hurting people too, that we are sinful and need help?               Why do we act like we can do it all on our own and like we can handle everything with grace and style and a smile on our faces?   Why do we spend so much time and energy polishing up our outsides?   Is it t o earn approval?   To make God happy and proud of us?   To impress others?   To feel better about ourselves?   To look better than others?             Honestly, all we are doing is hurting everyone.   When we are not real, we miss out on a genuine relationship with God and others. ...
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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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9 Marks of a Calvinist Cult: Conclusion and Links

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[This series is  "The 9 Marks of a Calvinist Cult"  split up into smaller, individual posts.]   Conclusion: Sadly, the  Psychology Today  article lists some of the lasting effects of cults, the devastation it has on people's hearts and minds, such as (among others): extreme identity confusion, panic/anxiety attacks, depression, anger and guilt and shame, inability to make their own decisions (to trust their own judgment), fear of intimacy and commitment, distrust of others, grieving the loss of family and friends, loss of meaning or purpose, PTSD, etc. I think Calvinism does this to people too.  I think the longer someone stays in a Calvinist church, the more it will destroy their faith (what should be a simple faith), their relationship with God, their trust of God, and their ability to discern truth for themselves, to understand the Bible the way God meant it to be understood.   And if and when someone leaves a Calvinist church, it may destroy t...
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When Sunday Comes

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First: The last scene of the Passion of the Christ (7 minutes long)  Today, let's remember why Jesus came to earth, died, and rose again: “… ‘Look, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the whole world.”  ( John 1:29 ) "For what I received I passed onto you as of first importance: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day, according to the Scriptures,"  ( 1 Cor. 15:3-4 ) “Consequently, just as the result of one trespass was condemnation for all men, so also the result of one act of righteousness was justification that brings life for all men.”  ( Romans 5:18 ) "Jesus said to her, 'I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me will live, even though he dies,"  ( John 11:25 ) “In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, in accordance with the riches of God’s grace.”  ( Ephesians 1:7 ) “Jesus answered, ‘I am the way and the t...
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Things My Calvinist Pastor Said #13: God Doesn't Love Everyone

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(This "Things My Calvinist Pastor Said" series is a breakdown on this much longer post:  "We Left Our Church Because of Calvinism,"  which was written last year but updated July 2020.  They are almost exact quotes.  All memes were created with  imgflip .) 13.   "The Bible says God loves people.  But the Bible is clear that God does not love  all  people and He doesn't love everyone  equally .  He elected some sinners to salvation, and He predestined some for eternal damnation."             Find me the verse that says God does not love everyone the same way!  Or a verse about how God's love is shown by whether or not He elects you to heaven.  Find me an  actual verse  that  clearly  says something like that, not just a mish-mash of verses, taken-out-of-context, about how God loved Jacob and hated Esau (the passage my pastor was using).       ...
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"Lonely" by Justin Bieber

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I don't watch music videos often or go looking online for ones, but this one popped up on my feed and I was curious. Lonely  by Justin Bieber I'm posting a link to it for several reasons.   One is because it's so honest.  So heartbreakingly real.  So haunting.  My goodness!  (Well done, Justin.  My heart is aching for you.  I wish I could hug you right now.)   Two is because I think many people can relate to it, to feeling invisible, like they don't matter, like no one really cares what they're going through or how badly they're hurting inside. And three is because he uses some pretty heavy cuss words in it.  Yes, that's right, the "bad" words are one of the reasons I'm linking to it, why I'm suggesting that people - church people - watch it.   We, especially church people, all too often judge people (and ourselves) by outside things, like the clothes they wear, the things they eat or drink, the words they use, etc....
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Some Satire, Just For Fun

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Who doesn't love a little satire now and then ... Google Celebrates Noahic Covenant Anti-Choice Judge Progressive OB/GYN Ultrasound Tech Refuses To Tell Couples Whether Baby Boy Or Girl How Do You Define "Hate Speech"? Compassionate: This Democratic Representative Is So Opposed To Gun Violence That He's Willing To Nuke The Entire Country To Stop It Liberals Remind Nation Satire Only OK When Mocking Conservatives Tolerance Police Progressive Christian Wishes Jesus Were As Woke As She Is Progressive Probs Women's March Aides Force Ocasio-Cortez To Watch Entire Run Of Schoolhouse Rock Report: Millennials More Open To Socialism, Touching Hot Stove, Sticking Face In Sack Full Of Badgers Socialist Leaders Clarify: 'We Only Want Socialism For Everyone Else' Judge Orders Trump, Acosta To Wear Their Get-Along Shirt (Could you even imagine?  That would be so fun to see!) Fed Up With Oppressive Capitalism, Bernie Sanders ...
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One Pastor's Prophetic Dream of Things to Come

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I am not one for listening to other people's prophetic dreams or visions.  Far too many people over the years have thought God gave them some sort of special insight, which proved to be false or unimportant.  I am especially wary now since everything seems so "end timesy."  It's far too easy to get caught up in sensationalizing or over-spiritualizing everything.  But sometimes, someone's account of their dream or vision makes you go, "Hmm."  And while I still don't put much stock into other people's "God told me X,Y, or Z" stories, I do think some things are worth listening to and storing in the back of your mind.  Just in case.  These are strange days and, if we are really headed into the end times soon, then things will probably only get more "supernatural."  And if that's the case, then anything's possible.   (On a different note, having nothing to do with this pastor's dream, but speaking of "strange d...
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#6: When You Don't Feel Like You're Enough, August 2017 (repost)

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[Reposted from August 5, 2017.  I had my panic attack the summer of 2016.  I remember it took me about six months to not feel absolute panic every morning, to be able to wake up without feeling terror at the thought that I had to face another day, another chance for something bad to happen.  And it took me even longer to be able to really smile again, to feel a little lightness in my spirit, to be able to breathe again.  I mean, of course, I smiled before that.  I acted like I was okay.  But I didn't feel like smiling or being happy for the longest time.  I was just too afraid of life - too discouraged by life - to be able to smile.  This post was written as I was still working towards being "normal," as I worked on protecting my faith after the previous summer.  The way I see it, my life has been marked by that panic attack.  It's now "BPA" (Before Panic Attack) or "APA" (After Panic Attack).  That summer was just such a life- and...
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I know it sounds crazy but ...

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Okay, fine, I guess I'll officially start up this blog again, adding some new posts every now and then. A neighbor (a recent believer) and I were talking the other day about the rapture and the end times, prophecy and the book of Revelation, etc.  And I found myself saying "I know it sounds crazy.  It sounds crazy to talk about things like this, about prophecy and Jesus coming back and the tribulation and things like that." We Christians know how it sounds when we talk about these things - like we should be wearing tin-foil hats, claiming  that the government is reading our thoughts, that aliens have probed us, and  that we've seen Bigfoot working as a cashier at the local convenience store.  I know that the Bible and its teachings - on how the world was created, on how it will end, on prophecy, angels, demons, the spiritual battle, on Jesus being God and coming to earth in a human body to die for our sins and then being raised again from the dead, etc. - I know...
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