"Why does God care about who I sleep with?"

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Considering the condition of the world nowadays - with its loosey-goosy morals and lack of a true, stable, meaningful foundation - I think a lot of people might find some encouragement in this sermon from Willow Creek.  For being such a sensitive topic, this pastor did a great job addressing it (though I agree with him that he could've spoken a lot longer and covered a lot more about it): 

"Why does God care about who I sleep with?" 

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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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The Gospel Project: Calvinist or not?

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Disclaimer: I have never gone through The Gospel Project for myself, and so this post is based on articles I've read about it and - mostly - on my knowledge of Calvinism and how it operates.  And this post doesn't even have to do just with The Gospel Project, but with anything Calvinists write or teach, especially if they claim that they're not trying to teach Calvinism. I had a question come in the other day  on my  "comment corral" blog   from a reader called  MPenny: " The Gospel Project: Do you or anyone here have specific wordage or examples of non-biblical or calvinist material within this Bible study.  I know it was written by mostly calvinists so I would never do this study myself...but would like to warn others with more practical data....and save reading the entire thing myself...has anyone else read through the curriculum and have any thoughts.  Or know of any critical articles on the subject.  Also, THANK YOU HEATHER for making a blog ...
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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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UGW #9e and 9f: Unanswered Prayer & Maybe God's Not Listening

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Understanding God's Will 9e: Humbled By Unanswered Prayer: Another problem with the “name it and claim it” interpretation is that we are tempted to bail on God, to criticize ourselves for our “weak” faith, or to question Him when we don’t get the answers that we want or thought we would get.    It confuses us, discourages us, and blows our understanding of God and His Word out of the water.    And I think that God allows this helplessness and futility so that we can learn that it’s not about us, it’s all about Him!    That He is God and we are not!    And so that we dig deeper into the Word to see who God really is and what He has to say through all of it - and not just through the few passages that we are familiar with, that tell us we get what we want when we pray.                We want to lead and have control by our prayers, whereas true faith in God says, “Whatever happens, I still believe in You. ...
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Did He Visit My Church?

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Too funny!  Did the writer of this satirical article visit my church during my pastor's 8-month-long series on Romans?   I am absolutely convinced that my dogmatically-predestination pastor did a series on Romans specifically so he could talk about predestination for EIGHT MONTHS. (The good thing that came out of it is that I ended up thoroughly researching this issue and studying the Bible to come to the conclusion that I don't believe God predestines whether we go to heaven or hell.)
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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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Calvinist Comments: A God of Love?

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I will be posting some interactions between Calvinists and non-Calvinists from the comment sections of various Soteriology 101 posts.  It's interesting and informative to see the actual things that Calvinists themselves say about the Gospel and God, and to see how non-Calvinists respond.  (I made minor edits for clarity.  And for those who are not aware of my position on this: I am a strong anti-Calvinist.  I believe Calvinism distorts the Gospel horribly.  We recently left our home church of almost 20 years because of the newish, dogmatic Calvinist pastor who came on board.  And I have been researching it deeply and writing against it ever since he started preaching.) This interaction is from "5 Reasons Why I Stayed Out of Calvinism" : A non-Calvinist, Graceadict, made this comment: "Calvinism creates a god that is NOT a god of love….” And Calvinist Jtleosala responds:  1. Then, your claim that God loves all humanity is a “...
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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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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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Don't answer Calvinist questions. Dismantle them.

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  A snippet (edited a bit) from my post (on my other blog)  "When Calvinists say, 'But Sovereignty!' :  Many people often get suckered into Calvinism because of a Calvinist's strategic use of  false dichotomies , often starting with "Is God sovereign, or are you? "  We are  given two options: a ridiculous one that no good Christian would pick and the one that is designed to lead us deeper into Calvinism.   And it's a very effective method for a simple reason: We never question their definition of "sovereign."  We go "Oh, well, of course God is sovereign," and then we let the Calvinist implant their definition of sovereign into our minds, their idea of how a sovereign God must act... and before we know it, we're viewing the Bible through that lens. There are also other false dichotomies like " Is God all-powerful, or are you?   Does God control everything, or do you?  Did God save you, or did you save yourself?  Either God ...
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