My Crazy Faith

One of my favorite bands as a teen was DC Talk.  And I am talking way back from their first album with "Heavenbound" and "Spinnin' Round"  and their second album with "Nu Thang" and "I Love Rap Music."    (Wow, that really dates me!  And wow, was it nostalgic to go back and watch these videos again!)   I even had (have) their video tape "Rap, Rock, & Soul."  I tell ya, I was a fan!  Always will be.  (My friend and I even did a choreographed "dance" to "Spinnin' Round" in front of our Christian camp one year in matching blue button-down shirts and men's ties.  Thank God there were no cell phone cameras back then.)   Here's one of their great later ones, one many people can probably relate to: Fearless (And I've always loved these three also: "What If I Stumble?" and "Colored People" and who could forget "Jesus Freak."   I don't get the videos, but I love th...

 Here are some comments (mostly mine) from Soteriology 101's post called  "Nominal Calvinism" , lightly edited for better clarity (and sorry about the highlighting, I can't undo it): Graceadict says: Most of us here have been where these Calvinist are right now, drinking the kool aid of Calvinism until we read the scriptures without the Calvi-glasses on and were horrified at what we saw.  We saw how twisted and tortured the Calvinist interpretation really was.  How it distorts so many of God’s attributes. We experienced the oppression forced on us by clever word tactics used over and over again.  They tried to make us believe Calvinism was the only way scripture could be seen and that only the humble, the elect, the studied would see this secret knowledge.  And yes, there are many contradictions (in Calvinism) but ... "That is a 'mystery,'” they told us, "and you have to be humble enough to hold those contradictions in tension even if the contradicti...

Did you ever wonder about Jesus?  Was He real?  Who was He?  Does it really matter what you think about Him? Here is a good, hour-long video from a former journalist who sought to disprove Jesus but ended up believing in Him as Lord and Savior: The Case For Christ by Lee Strobel [Also see my post "Support for Jesus and the Bible" ]

I took my "Stupid Chipmunk" post and ran it through Google Translate a lot of different times to see what happened. Original Post: If there's a chipmunk that sits five feet outside your dining room window every morning (where you like to sit in the quiet of the morning with your coffee and Bible, enjoying a few moments of peace before the day gets going) ... and this chipmunk chirps shrill-ly and loudly every 3 seconds for hours on end ... and you want to scare it off by throwing something at it ... let me tell you what NOT to do:

Understanding God's Will #9i: So how long do we continue to hang in there and pray for something that doesn’t seem to be happening?    When it seems like God is not listening and it hurts us to have to plead  again  about a certain request?    I’ve pleaded with God for things that haven’t happened or that were a long time in coming.    And this is the best advice I can offer right now.    If you have given your concern over to Him in prayer and invited Him to open or close the doors as He sees fit, if you have confessed any known sin and asked Him to reveal any hidden sin, if you are abiding in Him and seeking His guidance in His Word and in prayer, if you have examined your heart to see if you really trust Him (and have worked through any distrust or doubt with Him), and if you are willing to hear the answer  whatever it may be  and to obey  whatever He asks you to do  ... and if it still seems like God is not ...

A short, powerful testimony from Korn's lead singer, Brian Welch (8 minutes). No one is beyond the reach of God's grace and love, of forgiveness and healing.

(All memes made with  IMGFLIP )   A Calvinist Song "Jesus loves ..." God causes everything, right? Hmm!?! Yep, Makes Perfect Sense! Scroll Of Truth When it turns ugly Surely that must mean ... How A Calvinist ... And then the Calvinist said ... See, nobody cares! Who does God love? That face you make ... Don't you Calvinists know ... I don't know if ... That would be great ... I don't want to hear your opinion ... If a tree falls ... Still waiting ... And the results say ... How Calvinism Was Created Two Calvinists Talking... Yes, I know they're a little childish.  But I'm having fun making them anyway.  It's my way of venting some of the frustration of leaving our church because of Calvinism and of not being able to talk to anyone at church about it because no one else - except one other family - seems to care.  And so, yes, I'm allowing myself to be a little childish now and then, for my own amusement. Or was I "predestined" to be a lit...

Just in case anyone missed this post (the longer title made it easy to miss the "ESV" part) ... "A Random Verse That Destroys Calvinism (And "Is The ESV a Calvinist Bible?") In that post, I write about a bunch of verses that I believe were intentionally translated to be more Calvinistic or based on manuscripts that are too corrupt to be trusted.  (Click on it to see the verses.)   And why would I think that the translators of this Bible version would do that? (From that post...) The ESV and ESV Study Bible are majorly preferred by Calvinists.  In fact, it's often considered "The Calvinist Bible."   Why?  And why would translators of a Bible make these kinds of Calvinist tweaks to Scripture? Wayne Grudem and J.I. Packer were editors on the  ESV Study Bible   (this is for the ESV Global Study Bible).  Grudem and Packer are both popular, strong, dogmatic Calvinists.  Very Big Names in the world of Calvinism.  Grudem in the General...