Justin Bieber's "Holy"

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I saw this pop up in the news feed and I was curious, so I clicked on it.  I really didn't expect to be so touched by it.  What a great video!  A little bit of encouragement in these dark days.  (It premiered 16 hours ago and already has over 8 million views.) 

"Holy" by Justin Bieber

Most Popular Posts of the Week:

When Calvinists say "But predestination!" (tiny, bare-bones version)

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[Here's the tiniest version of my "But predestination!" post.  The short version with more memes and quotes and information can be  found here , and t he longest version (a series of posts full of many more Calvinist comments, my Calvinist ex-pastor's sermons, and my replies to them, written for my own amusement and for my ex-church) can be found by  starting here .  But this tiny version includes only the most basic parts you need to know, with a few memes and quotes thrown in to spice it up and prove my points.  (I know this could be much tinier, but Calvinism has so many bunny trails, so many interlocking ideas, that it's hard to address one part without addressing more.  So this is as comprehensively tiny as I dared to make it.) ] At the heart of Calvinism is predestination and God's sovereignty (among other things, like "total depravity"), which according to Calvinism essentially amounts to:  "God preplans and controls everything, even sin ...
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Another one bites the dust

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[Happy Easter, y'all!] I just found this (sad!) on Reddit Reformed:  What happened to my conviction and love for God? Reformedhabeshagirl  said: Hello brothers and sisters I have always been a Christian and grew up fearing the Lord. I remember being convicted about my sins as young as 7 or 8 years old. I became Reformed around age 17 and I am 23 now. I have always been a repentant believer. My heart used to break when I sinned, and I love the Lord. I studied my Bible a lot, prayed often, and was very interested in theology, sermons, and everything related to faith. The problem is that my heart has lost all desire for the things I used to love. I stopped listening to sermons and I don’t want to study my Bible anymore. Any interest I had in Bible study or discussions about the Lord only came when my ex-boyfriend shared things with me every day or when it came from my pastor every Sunday. Now my heart feels hard. I am not convicted about the things I used to mourn over. I distanc...
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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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Just Gotta Say I Feel Good Today

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I just gotta say that I feel pretty good today.  It's been awhile since I've felt so ... relieved, I guess.   And I think it really helped to vent the other day .  To complain a bit.  To not have to try so hard to filter everything I say.  (And yet, I did filter.  I was careful.)  But it felt good to be honest.  As honest as I could be. And it helped that an eye visit for two of my sons (right after I wrote that post)went well.   Given all the "waiting for the next pummeling" that I tend to feel every day, I have a really hard time handling some of the most basic things that other people can easily handle.  Last minute changes in plans throw me for a loop.  Too many things scheduled in one week (say, 2-3 things) stresses me out.  Being asked "How are you doing?" makes me want to activate my cloaking device.  Allowing the kids to drive in a car with anyone other than me or my husband freaks me out.  (I used to be...
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When Calvinists say "But predestination!" (sermons)

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[This series was written mainly for my ex-church, so they could see the Calvinist pastor's own words, and why I think he's wrong.  In the posts following this one, I will examine in more depth some of the things he preached. Here's the posts in the whole series:  the pastor's sermons  ("When Calvinists say 'But predestination!'"), and my comments  1-4 (election)  and  5-6 (Romans and sovereignty)  and  7-9 (depravity, Book of Life, predestine)  and  10-11 (shaming tactics, Feb. 2015)  and  12-14 (dead, regeneration, born again)  and  15 (total depravity, manipulation)   and  16A (God's Will, babies)  and  16B (sin, evil, suffering)  and  17 (double-speak and the gospel) . For the shorter "for everyone" version which has a lot less quotes and a lot less o f my thoughts, click here .   And click here for the  teeniest-tiniest version  of it. ] Calvinism centers around th...
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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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God Would Never Do That! Or Would He?

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God would never send a famine or economic distress to get our attention. God would never send disease to open our eyes to our bad choices and to call us to repentance. God would never use wars or violence to cause us to cry out to Him. God would never use a tornado, earthquake, or tsunami to draw our hearts back to Him. God is not like that.   He is a soft, squishy, all-loving God who would never dream of punishing or disciplining or causing any kind of pain for us.   He just wants us to be happy.  He’s all about catering to our requests and pouring out His goodness on us and allowing us to live life on our own terms, because we are the center of the universe.   We are the lords of our own lives.   Aren’t we?   Surely, in this day and age of rampant sexual diseases, violent wars, economic recession, famines, natural disasters, devastating consequences of our choices, etc., none of this has been allowed by God in order to ope...
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Two Amusing Articles On The Media

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I have long been bothered by the totally-biased coverage of the media and Hollywood (particularly against Christians, but also against conservative values).   In general, I think the media is a joke.  It lacks integrity and can't be trusted.  It reports what it wants people to believe and it over-emphasizes the conflicts it wants to report on, creating more conflict so that it then can report more of it.   I think in so many areas, it starts and fuels the flames of the fires it then reports.   Basically, they find a tiny, hot ember somewhere ... then they add fuel to the fire until it's raging out of control ... and then they report the fire like, "Oh my gosh, look!  It's a fire!" Well ... duh!  It's because you wrote all the biased articles and drew the attention of millions of people to the things you wanted to highlight.  You swayed the opinion of everyone with your slanted writing. I barely read the news anymore because I can't trust...
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Spiritual Warfare: Sword of the Spirit 5 (Scripture-based prayers)

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And finally, to end the "Sword of the Spirit" posts: When I was going through my worst, hardest times and was full  of anxiety, depression, hopelessness, and helplessness, there were a few things that helped give me some relief (herbal teas, herbal tinctures, homeopathic remedies, positive thinking, walks, mindless but relaxing TV shows, worship music, reading the Bible, saying verses out loud or writing them by hand, etc.).   But I could tell that my soul needed something more, something deeper, more powerful, more effective.   And so I decided to try something that I had always  been curious about: Praying Scripture back to God, turning verses into prayers, grabbing onto the truths and promises in Scripture that fit our need at the moment and praying them back to Him,  trusting Him to answer.   And when I did that, it calmed my anxious soul in a way that nothing else did or could.   Even just looking through God's Word for th...
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Calvinist (Bad Logic) Comment #6: The Role of Faith and the Gospel

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6.   A Calvinist says:   "In the absence of faith, any exhortation to believe the Gospel would be fruitless.  In the presence of faith, the preaching of the Gospel results in salvation." [My note: Calvinism teaches that the "elect" can only respond to the Gospel because God first gives them the faith to believe, that the Holy Spirit indwells them before they hear the Gospel in order to wake them up to spiritual things so that they can understand the Gospel, and all because they were "chosen" for salvation before time began.  Therefore, faith and "being saved" and getting the Holy Spirit all come before hearing and responding to the Gospel.  But then Calvinists will try to say that the Gospel is necessary for and leads to faith and salvation.  Think about this for a moment.  Seriously.] Someone (Aiden) then asks him:   "If faith in the gospel can only come by hearing the gospel, how pray tell, do you [Calvinists] have faith comi...
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