Colin wrote:
Thank you elder John for your continued words of wisdom.

Frank wrote:
Very interesting thought that puts this in perspective; no they would block the parents from sending those kids to school. No one will disagree with this.

I am confused about the way people feel about this pandemic or made up pandemic. So many believe it is a conspiracy and the question comes to mind as to why it would be a world-wide conspiracy. We tend to look at life where we live, but not in other places. Why would all of those other countries conspire in the same way? It doesn’t make any sense to me.

Mike wrote:
I wonder why a court that acts in contempt of the top law of the land isn’t held in contempt? Thankful there are a few good judges.

“That was going to mean a drastic shift in my life,” she stated. “It was going to mean that I was going to have to answer to this God and I was going to have to lose relationships, which I did, in order to follow Him and follow after Him wholeheartedly.”
[from the article]

It sure looks as though the Spirit of God was at work in her life, showing her the cost of following Jesus; that Christianity was real, that Jesus Christ was real, that becoming a Christian would mean changes in her lifestyle.

Colin wrote:
I am a 33 year old millennial and I can’t explain the joy and awe that I go through thinking about the fact that God called me through His mercy and grace. If not for His Grace I would be part of that dark dead mass. May we all remember to die to self and live what’s left of this vapor to bring glory to our great God and Savior Jesus Christ.

Salvation of the sinner is a most amazing thing. A lot of things happen in conversion, which is why many preachers focus on the gospel message week in and week out.

Galatians 2:20 KJV
(20)  I am crucified with Christ...

This was Paul's testimony, and it happens to everyone that is born again. To understand what "I" means in this text is a great progress in the Christian faith.

Those who believe in baptism by immersion symbolise this dying with Christ by going down into the water, and the new life in Christ by rising up out of the water.

The spiritual reality of this biblical experience is the ending of something, and the beginning of something, such that the convert is a "new creature in Christ", clearly visible to those around them; maybe not immediately because they are a babe, but in time there will always be the evidence of God's grace in their life.

Ladybug wrote:
The one thing Trump got right was stating he has never repented of sin...good thing. For repentance from sin is never included as a 'condition' to be saved. Every person alive on this earth right now is a sinner, even the elect. You don't stop sinning when God saves you, He does not take away the sin nature. What He does do is open the mind to the fact that you cannot be saved based on your foolish attempts at stopping something you have no ability to stop.
When your foundations are faulty, i.e., your 'gospel', then everything thereafter will be faulty as well.
Those who disagree like to trot out that 'antinomian' accusation, proving they themselves are void of understanding it is grace that saves, not grace plus what you think you do...antinomian means 'no law', so in essence those who accuse of this must then adhere to 'law' as a means of salvation. "For as many as are of works of the Law are under a curse, for it has been written: "Cursed is everyone who does not continue all things having been written in the book of the Law, to do them." Galatians 3:10. Fleeing sin is NOT a condition for salvation.

1. Fellowship of the saints
2. Personal prayer life
3. Personal Bible study

Dr. Tim wrote:
If Bill and Ben weren’t so intelligent, I’d say they act like Democratic Congressmen.

Dr. Tim wrote:
Wisdom doesn’t count for much with “the crowd” does it, John? Even in Solomon’s day a “poor wise man” (Ecclesiastes 9:16) didn’t get the same attention as a rich fool. Nowadays if someone has a “big name” all their words are to be hung on by the breathless mob of dunces. People with no more sense than an ostrich (Job 39:13-17) are considered oracles just because they can “rap” (I’d like to rap a few of them!) or dunk a basketball. So we have dunces listening to idiots who promote stupidity and endorse nincompoops, all because the idiots are “very popular.” Heaven help us.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3kW7h-5lLC4

Dr. Tim wrote:
Mickey and Minnie Mouse are a very popular couple, as are Popeye and Olive Oyl. Therefore, we should pay close heed to their every utterance.

[And hereby we do know that we know him - If we keep the commandments of God, loving him with all our heart, and our neighbor as ourselves, we have the **fullest proof** that we have the true saving knowledge of God and his Christ. The Gnostics pretended to much knowledge, but their knowledge left them in possession of all their bad passions and unholy habits; they, therefore, gave no proof that they had known either God or his Son Jesus - nor is any man properly acquainted with God, who is still under the power of his sins.] Adam Clarke

A new creature in Christ behaves differently from how they behaved when they were in Adam. This is a work of God - the new heart, the new nature. The big change does not merit salvation - it IS salvation. It is deliverance from:

1. The consequences of sin
2. The power of sin
3. Eventually even from the presence of sin

Nowhere in the NT are Christians called sinners; they are called saints many times (despite their failings).

So it went on the next night and the next, and finally the young man went and told the chaplain what had taken place, and asked what he should do.

“Well,” said the chaplain, “you are not at home now, and the other men have just as much right in the barracks as you have. It makes them mad to hear you pray, and the Lord will hear you just as well if you say your prayers in bed and don’t provoke them.”

For weeks after the chaplain did not see the young man again, but one day he met him, and asked—

“By the way, did you take my advice?”

“I did, for two or three nights.”

“How did it work?”

“Well,” said the young man, “I felt like a whipped hound, and the third night I got out of bed, knelt down and prayed.”

“Well,” asked the chaplain, “how did that work?”

The young soldier answered: “We have a prayer-meeting there now every night, and three have been converted, and we are praying for the rest.”]