If you have followed my blog postings for the last few months you already know what the fourth pillar that supports learning to think by faith, “How does God relates to us?”, will be. You are sure it will be, “God relates to us absolutely by grace alone, and not assisted by anything we do ourselves,” and you are right. However, just in the last ten years or so, after 50 years as a serious, involved Christian who would have answered the same way…

Even though Paul says “we have the mind of Christ” in 1 Corinthians 2:16, learning to think God’s way, “by faith,” instead of seeing everything as fallen man naturally does, through the lens of “good and evil,” is a lifelong process. God’s way of thinking by faith is totally different, and we are examining the  five theological pillars that are essential to learn to think this way.  The first four of these pillars are all anathema to today’s spreading postmodernism. This Marxist Critical Theory…

Presuppositions are unrecognized assumptions we all have that dictate how we think. We generally never question whether those assumptions are true (biblical) or not. In the last blog posting, I built a biblical case for one of those presuppositions, “free will,” being a non-biblical one, and how that false assumption has influenced how we think about God.  We all believe God is “sovereign,” but we think there surely must, somehow, still be a little wriggle-room for exercising my own free will to contribute something…

“‘For My thoughts are not your thoughts, Nor are your ways My ways,’ says the LORD. ‘For as the heavens are higher than the earth, So are My ways higher than your ways, And My thoughts than your thoughts’” (Isaiah 55:8, 9). “But we have the mind of Christ” (1 Corinthians 2:16). How should I think about the situation in which we find ourselves after the first week of the Biden presidency? Resignation, fear, anger, determination, anticipation and excitement are several live possibilities. Notice…

“The word ‘foundations,’ in this psalm, refers to those things on which society rests, or by which social order is sustained – the great principles of truth and righteousness that uphold society, as the foundations on which an edifice rests, uphold the building. The reference is to a destruction of those things in a community, when truth is no longer respected; when justice is no longer practiced; when fraud and violence have taken the place of honesty and honor; when error prevails; when a…

I woke up very early this morning with a single idea filling my mind. Interestingly, I have discovered that the Lord chooses to communicate with me at that particular time, because this often happens. So, I have learned to pay careful attention to what those ideas are when they come. This morning it was the whole idea of what the familiar phrase, “born again,” means.  In light of the current political situation, we have understandably been discussing the civil government, one of the expressions…

Extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice; moderation in the pursuit of justice is no virtue.  Barry Goldwater Goldwater first uttered these words in his campaign for president as the Republican candidate, running against the Democrat Lyndon Johnson in 1964. They were a response to accusations against him that he was “an extremist, a danger to society. He will start a nuclear war with Russia,” the Democrats loudly proclaimed from every media source, which, at that time were only the traditional ABC,…

Are you aware that today’s politics are not like your grandpa’s politics? Gone are the days when collegiality, bipartisanship and a mutual appreciation of the “loyal opposition” allowed our representatives in Congress to reach across the aisle with their political opponents. In those days, everyone loved America, was a proud patriot, and wanted to preserve our nation. Those days are over. There is a spiritual war raging all around us, and now, for the first time in our lifetime, our very way of life,…

My constant emphasis on this blog over the years has been the two edges of the Sword of the Word of God, and the two distinctly different, even opposite, ministries of these two edges. The two edges are grace vs. law, faith vs. obedience, gospel vs. kingdom, what is “above you” (your relationship with God) vs. what is “beneath you” (your responsibilities here on the earth)—four different ways to express the same idea. It has been about 20 years ago that I first began…

Beth Moore, popular Christian Bible teacher, recently tweeted, “I do not believe these are days for mincing words. I’m 63 1/2 years old & I have never seen anything in these United States of America I found more astonishingly seductive & dangerous to the saints of God than Trumpism. This Christian nationalism is not of God. Move back from it.” Moore is not questioning Donald Trump’s lack of character, his crass ways, his attacking style or his failure to appear “presidential,” which are the…