Friday, October 30, 2009
The Ultimate Purpose For Our Existence
Man's chief and highest end is to glorify God, and fully to enjoy Him forever.
__Westminster Larger Catechism, Question and Answer 1
Thou shalt guide me with thy counsel, and afterward receive me to glory.
Whom have I in heaven but thee? and there is none upon earth that I desire beside thee.
My flesh and my heart faileth: but God is the strength of my heart, and my portion for ever.
For, lo, they that are far from thee shall perish: thou hast destroyed all them that go a whoring from thee.
But it is good for me to draw near to God: I have put my trust in the Lord GOD, that I may declare all thy works. (Psalms 73:24-28)
For of him, and through him, and to him, are all things: to whom be glory for ever. Amen (Romans 11:36)
Sunday, October 25, 2009
The Overarching Theme of the Bible
Wednesday, October 21, 2009
God Justifies the Wicked
_Michael Horton__ from The Gospel-Driven Life
Tuesday, October 20, 2009
Greg Koukl Interviews David Berlinski
Sunday, October 18, 2009
From John Bunyan
Friday, October 16, 2009
A Marshmallow Gospel
Tuesday, October 13, 2009
Sunday, October 11, 2009
Jesus comments on John 3:16
John 3:16
For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life.
"Truly, truly, I say to you, he who believes has eternal life."
"No one can come to Me unless the Father who sent Me draws him..."
"All that the Father gives Me will come to Me, and the one who comes to Me I will certainly not cast out. For I have come down from heaven, not to do My own will, but the will of Him who sent Me."
"This is the will of Him who sent Me, that of all that He has given Me I lose nothing, but raise it up on the last day. For this is the will of My Father, that everyone who beholds the Son and believes in Him will have eternal life, and I Myself will raise him up on the last day."
And later he says to his disciples, "No one can come to Me unless it has been granted him from the Father."
(Bible quotes from NASB)
The doctrine implicit in this text and Jesus' comments bars no one from receiving forgiveness of sins and eternal life who truly desires it. Rather, it provides hope for many who otherwise would have entered eternity unforgiven and forever condemned.
Wednesday, October 7, 2009
A Cruel and Jealous God
Yesterday I was reading a comment by a professed atheist who complained that the God in whom Christians believe is "cruel, jealous, and vengeful," and that if this God existed, he would want to have nothing to do with him. Is this charge true?
Our Creator-God is also Love; and what does he love? Well, the Father loves his Son supremely (John 3:35), but he also loves the people who are his own, as is shown in the verse quoted above. He is jealous over them, as the bible often says, and whoever desires to harm them or attempts to draw them away from him certainly makes himself the object of God's wrath and vengeance.
The people whom Jesus Christ purchased at the cost of his own blood are more valuable to God, for Christ's sake, than we can ever imagine. He calls them the "apple of his eye." His gaze is continuously upon them. The "apple" of the eye is the pupil. If you have ever seen your own reflection in someones eye, you can appreciate the imagery in those words.
The atheist I mentioned sees God from the viewpoint of one who is at enmity with him. He is correct in what he says; God is jealous over his own people and has set himself firmly against anything or anyone who would do them harm. (Zech. 2:8) His love is indeed as strong as death, and his jealously cruel as the grave.