Get Some Theology

Problems with the Long "S" in old books

2011-11-09T13:51:00.000-08:00

Start this one at 11:35 for the joke about reading the Bible with the "long S".

She is not reading the passage she states, but it is still funny.

here is the wikipedia article
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Long_s

Stupid Mistakes Churches Make

2010-09-02T16:25:00.000-07:00

I saw this book a couple of weeks ago and I thought that it was interesting.

I'm not into church growth strategies. I think God does give the increase when we are following his word. That's really probably not what this book is about. It is about some things that give a bad first impression to visitors. I do think that is important, and we shouldn't make these dumb mistakes. This isn't a book I would spend much on. I'm not sure I would buy a hard copy, but I would download it to my book reader. I think it has some decent advice.

For example, the cover of this book shows a funny cartoon of a church not trimming its bushes back so that the service times are hidden. That is totally hilarious, but sadly true of some churches. They do things that do not allow them to get there name out their. One example is when the church sign NEVER GETS CHANGED.

The last church I went to was notorious for this. The sign that was up EASTER services might have been up for weeks AFTER EASTER. The sign for the FIRST SUNDAY AFTER TRINITY was up until at least the EIGHTH SUNDAY AFTER TRINITY. I'm sorry, but I think people start to wonder..."Did that church close? Their sign never changes!"

Audio and Video for D. A. Carson’s The God Who Is There

2010-08-05T16:45:00.000-07:00

Audio and Video for D. A. Carson’s The God Who Is There

Download these mp3 files and listen. They are well worth your time.

Matt Chandler on Preaching the Gospel to the "De-Churched"

2010-08-03T19:11:00.000-07:00

Watch and listen to this sermon by pastor Matt Chandler on the problem of the "De-churched." It will really make you think and convict your heart.

D.A. Carson on the Gospel being an aroma and life and death.

2010-07-24T17:15:00.000-07:00

Biblical Qualifications for Church Elders/Prebyters/Pastors (yes, and even Episcopal priests)

2010-07-24T13:15:00.000-07:00

I'm going to let this list speak for itself!

Click on the image for a larger view.

The Bible and Current Events: Kum & Go Robbery on 7/21/2010

2010-07-23T08:36:00.000-07:00

Then Jesus said to him, “Put your sword back into its place. For all who take the sword will perish by the sword.
(Matthew 26:52 ESV)

This attempted robbery occurred at 86th and Main at the Kum and Go gas station/convenience store just two doors down from Bethel Baptist Church of Owasso.

Ezekiel 35:6
6 therefore, as I live, declares the Lord God, I will prepare you for blood, and blood shall pursue you; because you did not hate bloodshed, therefore blood shall pursue you

Romans 1:18-32 "The Lost World" That is NOT Science Fiction

2010-07-01T03:09:00.000-07:00

No, The Apostle Paul is not talking about dinosaurs who have survived into modern times (like the Arther Conan Doyle story) nor about dinosaurs who's DNA was cloned to create a prehistoric theme park. THIS lost world is about the human race on this planet right now. No science fiction here!
Paul spells out here why the world needs the gospel so much. It is because this world is so radically in rebellion against God, even though DEEP DOWN each person KNOWS WHAT THE TRUTH IS. We are all in this boat. But Paul focuses in this passage on the unrighteousness of the Gentiles. He will talk about the unrighteousness of the Jews in chapter 2, and ALL the world in chapter 3 (the famous "all have sinned" quote).. But here is the flow of his argument.

God's wrath is revealed against all unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth in unrighteousness.
What we can know of God is plain because

God has shown it to them.
God's attributes, eternal power, and nature have been clearly seen in creation.
THEREFORE, this world of unrighteous people is WITHOUT EXCUSE.

DEEP DOWN these people have an innate knowledge of God, BUT

they do not honor God.
they do not give Him thanks.
THEREFORE,

their thinking has become futile.
their hearts have become darkened!

Two FANTASIES have been created as a direct result of this refusal to acknowledge the true God. These fantasies we tend to call IDOLATRY.

Men claim to be wise, but in reality are fools. Isn't that the basic sin of ALL SINS? Is this not what Eve believed in the Garden when the serpent told her that eating the fruit would make her wise like God?
Men exchanged worship of the incorruptible glorious God for worship of the corruptible creature.
THEREFORE, three consequences of this idolatry have occurred. God has given men up to:

the lusts of their hearts (vv 24-25)
dishonorable passions (vv 26-27). Notice that Paul doesn't say debased actions. It goes without saying that debased actions easily follow debased passions. The example is the sexual perversion of going against nature as God created it. But many people have passions that can even replace their a righteous passion for God. These are not at grievous, but still sinful when they are put above God.
debased minds (vv. 28-32)

ESV Study Bible

2010-06-19T22:21:00.000-07:00

I finally broke down and got this with some cash I had on hand. I got the duotone (that's a fake leather that feels more like a rubber tire). It was a super bargain before Father's Day at only $37.50.

But the thing I REALLY wanted this for was the online access to the ESV Study Bible online. I think I'll keep this at my desk during the school year. I will NOT lug this to church on Sundays.

Bible Verse Poster with Noah

2010-06-14T15:22:00.000-07:00

Matthew 18 and Church Gripes: Why People Leave

2010-06-14T05:35:00.000-07:00

We had an interesting experience at a church we attend Sunday evenings (because our own church does not have an evening service). This body is experiencing a lot of internal strife. We think it is sad because we love going there and hearing the preaching. But I find that many people are not following the principles found in that passage of Scripture commonly known as Matthew 18.......

I wanted to stand up and say that this church has been a blessing to our children through its Awana programs and Wednesday evening Prayer/Bible Study. I wanted the congregation to know that they ARE functioning at the church ought to, and the leadership IS taking it in the right direction. But I didn't think it was appropriate to speak since I am not a member there, and I minister elsewhere. I'm sorry to see such disunity in a wonderful congregation. I think our American church shopping culture has caused much of this. People feel that their FELT NEEDS must be met first. This is basically giving in to the marketing emphasis of our culture. Church has become a product to be consumed, rather than the mystical body of Christ where we each must function as a body part. (ANOTHER GREAT PASSAGE IS 1 Corinthians 12: 12-31). This is truly sad that this felt needs mentality has been adopted by so many who has left this excellent congregation of believers. Hopefully the church will go on and evangelize. I believe they will.

Hookers for Jesus????????

2010-05-27T16:35:00.000-07:00

Yes, this is a real ministry. No joke. I don't mean to make fun. These people need the hope of the gospel just as we all do. I just think the name is a bad choice. I had to laugh when I heard this silly name for a ministry.
.........But then again, remember what the Apostle Paul said.in 1 Corinthians 6:9-11

⁹Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Be not deceived: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind,
¹⁰Nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners, shall inherit the kingdom of God.
¹¹And such were some of you: but ye are washed, but ye are sanctified, but ye are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of our God.

Satan the Legalist: A Blast from the SNL Past

2010-05-18T20:15:00.000-07:00

SNL The People's Court
- Watch more Funny Videos at Vodpod.

I think it is interesting that John Lovitz makes the point about only keeping the "letter" of the agreement.

Book Recommendation: The Prodigal God

2010-05-17T20:16:00.000-07:00

I just started reading this book, The Prodigal God, by Timothy Keller. It is a careful reading of the text of the famous parable of the "prodigal son" in Luke 15. My friends at Bethel Baptist in Owasso are going through this book as well, and Pastor Bill Ascol gave me a copy, along with the discussion guide to read. I greatly appreciate it.

A Whole Book to Tell People to "Lighten Up!" Calvin did it in a few chapters.

2010-05-11T15:49:00.000-07:00

I'm not sure why Joyce Meyer had to write a whole book to tell us we need to lighten up. Calvin actually did this in the16th century when he wrote the Institutes of the Christian Religion which includes the classic chapters called "The Golden Booklet of the True Christian Life," which is a few chapters from that grand theological work.

Nevertheless, I'm convinced that in spite of the lack of necessity of this book, Joyce Meyer is still a better preacher than Joel Osteen. She quotes several passages of Scripture in the first chapter, and actually admits that there is a problem of sin and guilt, and that God sent a Redeemer to free us from that problem. I haven't read this whole thing yet, only the first sample pages on Amazon.com. I'm not sure how her overall message turns out.

One of her chapters is titled "God likes a party." I do recall preaching in a sermon I did on the Gospel of John, chapter 2 story of the wedding at Cana in Galilee. I said in that sermon that Jesus turned the water into wine because he wanted to keep the party going. After all, HE was in attendance. Why should the party end? It was a picture of the joy we should have as Christians, especially when we are in His presence in worship. So unlike the claims of some dubious "Study Bibles" that He made Welch's Grape Juice (evident in the "shot glass" communion services of many an evangelical church), Jesus did make real wine that contained alcohol. It was the bridegroom's responsibility to provide for the wedding feast. Jesus showed his glory in that miracle to show us He was the TRUE BRIDEGROOM of his Church who would provide us what we need to celebrate our marriage to Him. He gives us joy as we rehearse that coming feast we will have with Him in glory when we enjoy His presence in Holy Communion on the Lord's Day. We can lighten up about the fact that it is wine in the chalice.

So if her message is like Calvin's (and I recommend you read his words)that we ought to avoid too many "extremes" in life, I'm sure I can agree with her. Calvin teaches us that God gives us good gifts for our legitimate use. We ought to enjoy them. But we should not cling to them. We've got to learn to hang on to this present life loosely. (No, I'm not quoting 38 Special's hit song "Hang on Loosely"--that one was about relationships.) Our practice ought to be that we are thinking upon the joys that we will experience in Heaven...think on the next life as we live in this one. I think if we do that, we can truly lighten up. We can make the proper distinction between what is temporal and what is eternal!

Another Easy Believeism T-shirt: Didn't they actually READ the verse?

2010-04-26T15:56:00.000-07:00

Seriously, if we are going to put these messages on t-shirts with a scripture reference, as least we ought to read the verse AND THE CROSS REFERENCES of the verse to makes sure that our message is a BIBLICAL one.

So Revelation 3:5 says this:
The one who conquers will be clothed thus in white garments, and I will never blot his name out of the book of life. I will confess his name before my Father and before his angels.

Right above this scripture reference of Revelation 3:5 is the statement "Jesus wants to put you in His Book" and the question "Do you accept".

But if one reads all the verses in the Book of Revelation about the "Lamb's book of life" one should come out with quite a different picture. The message of the shirt seems to say that Jesus is pleading with us to somehow "let him" put us in His book. But one of the main cross references reads this way:

Revelation 13:8
and all who dwell on earth will worship it, everyone whose name has not been written before the foundation of the world in the book of life of the Lamb who was slain.

The "it" that will be worshiped is the "beast" mentioned in Revelation. Those who worship the beast are those whose names have not been written in the book of life "before the foundation of the world." This is clearly a reference to election. So in terms of election, it seems, that those who will believe already have their names written in the Lamb's book of life from before the foundation of the world. There is no picture here of Jesus "wanting" to write names in. Rather, the picture is that the names of God's people already have been written in before time began.

See also Revelation 17:8 which also mentions that those names in the Book of Life were written before the foundation of the world.

So what is the point of the Revelation 3:5 reference? The verse appears in the Letter to the Church in Sardis. The verse is not about this notion of "Accepting Jesus as my personal savior," but rather that one must live in daily repentance and faith in order to OVERCOME or CONQUER. The context of this verse reads:

³Remember, then, what you received and heard. Keep it, and repent. If you will not wake up, I will come like a thief, and you will not know at what hour I will come against you. ⁴Yet you have still a few names in Sardis, people who have not soiled their garments, and they will walk with me in white, for they are worthy.

Clearly this is a warning passage to the Church, and specifically to individuals in the church who do NOT walk in daily repentance and faith. For John to write in verse 5 this message from Christ that there is this promise to the one who conquers of NOT being blotted out of the book of life, one must leave open the possibility that there is a sense in which a person can be in such close proximity to salvation, even be in a local church, but find himself blotted out by not repenting and believing the gospel. The parable of the wheat and the tares in Matthew 13:25-30, the words of Jesus Himself, should also be consulted here. In God's kingdom there will be a mixture of true wheat, and false wheat (the tares) within the same covenant community. That is why John is told to write these letters to Churches in the first part of the Book of Revelation. We in the church are warned to not become like those branches of John 15 that do not abide in Christ. They are cut off and thrown into the fire. What an important warning for us so that we live daily lives of repentance. So the Christian life isn't as easy as these t-shirts seem to suggest. Is it?

Yet another bad "Christian" (replace word with Pelagian) t-shirt

2010-04-17T16:31:00.000-07:00

Okay, there are so many problems with this t-shirt. Not only does it espouse "easy believe-ism", equating saving faith with a moment in time when one makes a "decision" for Christ without permanent change (after all it only takes a few minutes to save your soul, according to this message), but Jesus must be "accepted" rather than ask the question of how God comes to accept us as His own. That is the real issue. I need God's acceptance. He doesn't need mine.

The scripture reference it gives is Romans 10:9
⁹That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved.
Excellent verse, but certainly ripped out of context if it means what the shirt says "Accept Jesus-A few minutes will save your soul." That wonderful portion of Scripture certainly does NOT mean that!
Only a chapter earlier the Apostle Paul writes:

¹³As it is written, Jacob have I loved, but Esau have I hated.
¹⁴What shall we say then? Is there unrighteousness with God? God forbid.
¹⁵For he saith to Moses, I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion.
¹⁶So then it is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that sheweth mercy.
Romans 9:13-16

Even if the issue were that we are to "accept Jesus", Scripture is clear that it is certainly not "easy" in any sense of the word. In fact Jesus himself discusses that in John 6:44 where He says,

⁴⁴No man can come to me, except the Father which hath sent me draw him: and I will raise him up at the last day.

Later He adds,

⁶³It is the spirit that quickeneth; the flesh profiteth nothing: the words that I speak unto you, they are spirit, and they are life.
⁶⁴But there are some of you that believe not. For Jesus knew from the beginning who they were that believed not, and who should betray him.
⁶⁵And he said, Therefore said I unto you, that no man can come unto me, except it were given unto him of my Father.

Then the Scriptures tell us:

⁶⁶From that time many of his disciples went back, and walked no more with him.

Enough said. Now consider whether or not this is a "Christian" t-shirt, or whether it would be better labelled a Pelagian one (see article on the early church heresy of Pelagianism).

Rorschach Inkblots on Bad Christian Art

2010-04-15T17:14:00.000-07:00

A Roman Catholic parish in Warr Acres, Oklahoma (near Oklahoma City) is up in arms over this little bit of badly done iconography reminiscent of a Rorschach inkblot test.

Here is the article.

Do you see what others are seeing?

It kind of reminds me of that Everybody Loves Raymond episode where Ray's mother took a sculpting class, titled "Marie's Sculpture". (click link to watch on YouTube)

If I wasn't told what to look for, I might have missed it. I guess it depends on the how one's mind works. Now I think they should take it down just to prevent a scandal. I'm not thrilled about displaying bad Christian art in churches anyway.

See the video below.

Bad Christian T-Shirts 2: Jesus equal to comic book super hero

2010-04-10T20:30:00.000-07:00

This is just wrong on many levels (in addition to the fashion level). Comic book superheroes mortals with some kind of superpower but also having some kind of weakness (like Kyrptonite).

Jesus, on the other hand, is God incarnate who voluntarily laid aside his glory to take on human flesh and become the God-Man.

Remember the Christmas carol by Charles Wesley
"Veiled in flesh the Godhead see,
Hail the incarnate deity,
Please as man with men to dwell,
Jesus our Emmanuel!"

Philippians 2:5-11 says this:
"⁵Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus:
⁶Who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God:
⁷But made himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men:
⁸And being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross.
⁹Wherefore God also hath highly exalted him, and given him a name which is above every name:
¹⁰That at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth;
¹¹And that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father."
Jesus is no mere comic book superhero!

Bad Christian T-Shirts: Disrespecting Principalities and Powers

2010-04-10T20:06:00.000-07:00

Who would buy this? I doubt the screen printer made much on this.

The Biblical response to why a Christian should NOT where a shirt like this is in Jude 1:9

"Yet Michael the archangel, when contending with the devil he disputed about the body of Moses, durst not bring against him a railing accusation, but said, The Lord rebuke thee." (KJV)

Enough said!

"Experience Times" NOT Worship Times: another version of Me Centered church

2010-04-07T21:09:00.000-07:00

This is real. Click this link to find out the "Experience Times"

Yes, at this place of "experience" (At least they are honest that it is not a "place of worship") people meet regularly in the town where I live and teach. Last summer I walked into the local school where they meet to find it filled with a ton of displays from different movies like Terminator and Pirates of the Caribbean. One worker from this congregation told me the sermons that summer were about Hollywood movies. Evidently offering an "experience" that incorporates a lot of popular culture to attract crowds. I'd be willing to hear these sermons, but I wonder if much biblical exposition is really present.

A bunch of REALLY MACHO BIBLES....well almost all of them.

2010-04-06T18:26:00.000-07:00

These are all for real. No kidding.

Okay, so this happens to be the LARGE PRINT edition of the "Mossy Oak" Bible. This honestly concerns me. If you need a large print Bible why are you allowed to have a GUN hunting in the woods?
Second, if you drop then Bible to take aim at that buck, won't you have a hard time finding it again?

This is a metal camo Bible. I suppose a solder could place this over his heart for extra protection under his flack jacket.

Another Bible that could get lost in the woods, in this case, when duck hunting I guess.

The camo has been updated to digital on uniforms of our armed forces. So we have to update those Bibles too.

Here is that macho "woodlands" camo.

But if you prefer to be a little girley, here is another option.

Here is a Bible you can literally take into the pits at Indie.

I'm just trying to figure out when you would have time for devotions between changing tires serving on the Pit Crew.

Why this blog?

2010-04-06T17:49:00.000-07:00

I just thought I would offer some critique of some of the things in American evangelicalism that drive me nuts. We so much need a return to Biblical Christianity. This blog is dedicated to that.