Acceptance of violence as a tool for happiness - Jules Michelet

 The historian Jules Michelet later argued that the death of the former king led to the acceptance of violence as a tool for happiness. He said, "If we accept the proposition that one person can be sacrificed for the happiness of the many, it will soon be demonstrated that two or three or more could also be sacrificed for the happiness of the many. Little by little, we will find reasons for sacrificing the many for the happiness of the many, and we will think it was a bargain."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louis_XVI

Here I am Send Me - Calvary Chapel Fort Lauderdale

 

Exegetical Fallacies - DA Carson

 The final reason why this study has become important is the change in theological climate in the Western world during the past thirty or forty years. At the risk of oversimplification, one could argue that the generation of conservative Christians before the present one faced opponents who argued in effect that the Bible is not trustworthy, and only the ignorant and the blind could claim it is. In the present generation, there are of course many voices that say the same thing; but there are new voices that loudly insist our real problem is hermeneutical and exegetical. Conservatives, we are told, have not properly understood the Bible. They have imposed on the sacred text an artificial notion of authority and a forced exegesis of passage after passage. One of the emphases of the acerbic attack on “fundamentalism” by James Barr is that conservatives do not really understand the Bible, that they use critical tools inconsistently and even dishonestly. At another level, one of the explicit claims of the recent commentary on Matthew by Robert H. Gundry is that his approach to the text is more faithful to Scripture than that of traditional conservative commentators. Similar phenomena are legion.

King of Kings - Calvary Chapel Fort Lauderdale

 Lyrics Coming...

Matthew West - The God Who Stays Song

 

[Verse 1]

If I were You I would've given up on me by now

I would've labeled me a lost cause

'Cause I feel just like a lost cause

If I were You I would've turned around and walked away

I would've labeled me beyond repair

'Cause I feel like I'm beyond repair

[Pre-Chorus]

Oh, but somehow You don't see me like I do

Somehow You're still here

[Chorus]

You're the God who stays

You're the God who stays

You're the one who runs in my direction

When the whole world walks away

You're the God who stands

With wide open arms

And You tell me nothing I have ever done can separate my heart

From the God who stays

[Verse 2]

I used to hide

Every time I thought I let You down

I always thought I had to earn my way

But I'm learning You don't work that way

[Pre-Chorus]

'Cause somehow You don't see me like I do

Somehow You're still here

[Chorus]

You're the God who stays (You're the God who stays)

You're the God who stays (You're the God who stays)

You're the one who runs in my direction

When the whole world walks away

You're the God who stands (You're the God who stands)

With wide open arms (With wide open arms)

And You tell me nothing I have ever done can separate my heart

From the God who stays

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[Bridge]

My shame can't separate

My guilt can't separate

My past can't separate

I'm Yours forever

My sin can't separate

My scars can't separate

My failures can't separate

I'm Yours forever

No enemy can separate

No power of hell can take away

Your love for me will never change

I'm Yours forever

[Chorus]

You're the God who stays (You're the God who stays)

You're the God who stays (You're the God who stays)

You're the one who runs in my direction

When the whole world walks away

You're the God who stands (You're the God who stands)

With wide open arms (With wide open arms)

And You tell me nothing I have ever done can separate my heart

From the God who stays

You're the God who stays

You're the one who runs in my direction

When the whole world walks away

You're the God who stands

With wide open arms

And You tell me nothing I have ever done can separate my heart

From the God who stays

https://genius.com/Matthew-west-the-god-who-stays-lyrics

Matthew West - Imperfections SONG

 [Verse 1]

All of my life I've been making a list
Of all the things about me I'd change if I could
And the longer I live, the more I'm convinced
The bad and the ugly will outweigh the good
I beat myself up, I tear myself down
And it's never been harder to understand how

[Chorus]
You perfectly love me and all my imperfections
Still can't believe that it's true
How You perfectly love me and all my imperfections
And all my imperfections You'll use
[Verse 2]
I'm clumsy and foolish, I'm rеckless and clueless
If thеre's a wrong turn, I'll take it
But You keep on raising me up from my ruins
And tell me I'm something worth saving
The story of me is a story of grace
Every chapter's a new list of all of the ways

[Chorus]
You perfectly love me and all my imperfections
Still can't believe that it's true
How You perfectly love me and all my imperfections
And all my imperfections You'll use

[Post-Chorus]
Oh-oh-oh-oh-oh

[Verse 3]
All of my life I thought You had a list
Of all the things about me You'd change if You could
But here in Your presence, my heart is convinced
There's no part of me that You can't use for good

[Chorus]
Lord, You perfectly love me and all my imperfections
I'm finally believing it's true
How You perfectly love me and all my imperfections
And all my imperfections You'll use
All my imperfections You'll use
So, I give all my imperfections to You

https://genius.com/Matthew-west-imperfections-lyrics

Exegetical Fallacies: The Bible it purpose and importance - D.A. Carson

Careful handling of the Bible will enable us to “hear” it a little better. It is all too easy to read the traditional interpretations we have received from others into the text of Scripture. Then we may unwittingly transfer the authority of Scripture to our traditional interpretations and invest them with a false, even an idolatrous, degree of certainty. Because traditions are reshaped as they are passed on, after a while we may drift far from God’s Word while still insisting all our theological opinions are “biblical” and therefore true. If when we are in such a state we study the Bible uncritically, more than likely it will simply reinforce our errors. If the Bible is to accomplish its work of continual reformation—reformation of our lives and our doctrine—we must do all we can to listen to it afresh and to utilize the best resources at our disposal.

D. A. Carson, Exegetical Fallacies, 2nd ed. (Carlisle, U.K.; Grand Rapids, MI: Paternoster; Baker Books, 1996), 17–18.

The Best Keith Green Song - Born Again

Its impossible to have a best. But here it is

 

You're the sun, You're the starlight, You're a wave upon the sea. You're the glory of the sunrise as it sets the morning free. You're my hope for the future, It's your love that covers me And if I have my choice, I'll spend my life watching you watching me. When you came I was weary and I thought you couldn't see But you saw right through my masquerade, right to that secret place in me. Then your love held me gently, whispering everything's alright. I was born again into your love, born again into you light. Jesus, sometimes my mind grows cloudy and it's oh so hard to see That there's a life I'm meant to live for you Sometimes I've lived for me. When you came I was weary and I thought you couldn't see But you saw right through my masquerade right to that secret place in me. Then your love held me gently, whispering everything's alright. I was born again into your love, born again into your light.

What is the Good Life?

 So whats the Good Life? Apparently Good Life Brewing believe its 

• Camping
• Hiking
• Floating
• Biking
• Surfing
• Climbing
• And Beer

Information: From the Temple of Metaphysical Science

We encourage lectures on all subjects pertaining to our spiritual and secular welfare. We do not compel, urge or advocate any attempts by or to another person to worship God in any particular or prescribed manner. We advocate and promote spiritual healing. We protect and encourage spiritual teachers and mediums, who are followers of the light, in their efforts to prove the continuity of life. We encourage all people to keep an open mind as growing thought and investigation reveal new truths. We believe in personal responsibility. We believe that all individuals should be free to follow their hearts and minds in spiritual as well as secular matters, provided they remember to act with the highest, best and truest intent in any given situation.

https://www.tmsli.org/

Defining Spiritualism

See this interview with Stacy Kopchinski, Trustee on the National Board of the NSAC for insight into the history and nature of Spiritualism:  https://www.mysticmag.com/psychic-reading/nsac-interview/

Adopted by the National Spiritualist Association of Churches

Spiritualism is the Science, Philosophy, and Religion of continuous life, based upon the demonstrated fact of communication, by means of mediumship, with those who live in the Spirit World. (1919)

Spiritualism Is a Science because it investigates, analyzes and classifies facts and manifestations demonstrated from the spirit side of life.

Spiritualism Is a Philosophy because it studies the Laws of Nature both on the seen and unseen sides of life and bases its conclusions upon present observed facts. It accepts statements of observed facts of past ages and conclusions drawn therefrom, when sustained by reason and by results of observed facts of the present day.

Spiritualism Is a Religion because it strives to understand and to comply with the Physical, Mental and Spiritual Laws of Nature, which are the laws of God.

A Spiritualist is one who believes, as the basis of his or her religion, in the communication between this and the Spirit World by means of mediumship and who endeavors to mould his or her character and conduct in accordance with the highest teachings derived from such communication. (1914, Rev. 1938)

A Medium is one whose organism is sensitive to vibrations from the spirit world and through whose instrumentality, intelligences in that world are able to convey messages and produce the phenomena of Spiritualism. (1914)

A Spiritualist Healer is one who, either through one’s own inherent powers or through mediumship, is able to impart vital, curative force to pathologic conditions. (1930, 1993)

The Phenomena of Spiritualism consists of Prophecy, Clairvoyance, Clairaudience, Gift of Tongues, Laying on of Hands, Healing, Visions, Trance, Apports, Levitation, Raps, Automatic and Independent Writings and Paintings, Voice, Materialization, Photography, Psychometry and any other manifestation proving the continuity of life as demonstrated through the Physical and Spiritual senses and faculties of man. (1950)

1. We believe in God.
2. We believe that God is expressed through all Nature.
3. True religion is living in obedience to Nature’s Laws.
4. We never die.
5. Spiritualism proves that we can talk with people in the Spirit World.
6. Be kind, do good, and others will do likewise.
7. We bring unhappiness to ourselves by the errors we make and we will be happy if we obey the laws of life.
8. Everyday is a new beginning.
9. Prophecy and healing are expressions of God.

The art of preaching Old Testament Narrative - Haddon W Robinson

FOREWORD by Haddon W Robinson

My grandmother lived in Northern Ireland, and I visited her once when I was a lad about eight years old. When I met her, she was wrinkled, had snowy white hair, and stooped a bit under the weight of her years. I felt I knew my grandmother. She was that thin old lady who gave me cookies and told me how much I resembled my grandfather who had died many years ago.

Recently, I visited Ireland again and talked with cousins who knew my grandmother far better than I. They pulled out faded yellow photographs of grandma when she was a girl and later when she was first married. They shared their memories based on knowing her much longer than I did. I came away from that second visit wondering if I ever really knew my grandmother at all.

For many modern readers, the Old Testament narratives resemble my memories of my grandmother. We know them, but then again we hardly know them at all. Some of us grew up hearing these stories, and they form up in a part of our memory bank. We listened to them at home curled parent's lap, or we saw them pasted on flannelgraph boards in Sunday school, our short legs dangling from the big chairs. We identified with David, the brash teenager with a slingshot in hand, taking on Goliath, who resembled the bully at our grade school. We smirked at the neighbors who mocked Noah and his boys for building a boat miles from the nearest lake because we knew how the story came out, and we decided the moral was not to laugh at someone doing something strange because you might need them later on if you were drowning in a flood. We pictured Moses and Aaron battling Pharaoh much like the Lone Ranger and Tonto standing up against the bad guys, or we admired Daniel taming the lions in their den at the zoo. We knew these stories well, but we may not have known them at all! Because we thought of them as simple little stories, we missed how thick they were with meaning.

In recent years, many literary critics, both Christian and Jewish, have also read the stories again for the first time. Instead of regarding the narratives as cadavers to be dissected and "demythologized," they began to approach them for what they were sophisticated literature of great significance and splendid power.

Because narrative makes up the dominant genre of the Old Testament, biblical preachers need to revisit those narratives. As adults, we can look at the stories with fresh eyes, and we can develop an appreciation for the skill of the authors who composed them. They were not only corking good storytellers, but they were also brilliant theologians who taught their readers about God through stories. We can read these old, old stories in a new way and sense how much they speak to the condition of modern hearers. More than that, we can see God through them.

One of the strongest reasons for a serious and fresh study of Old Testament narratives is reflected in the sad history of what happens when we misread them, read them poorly, or read them to prove a point outside the purpose of the biblical storyteller. In fact, the more committed we are to the authority of Scripture, the more dangerous it is to read the narratives incorrectly. There is no greater abuse of the Bible than to proclaim in God's name what God is not saying. God commands us not to bear false witness.

In this book, Steve Mathewson helps us to read Old Testament narratives perceptively. As you study them, you will realize they are not quaint tales crafted to teach children simple moral lessons. They are great literature, every bit as powerful as Homer, Milton, Shakespeare, or Hemingway. And as God breathed literature, they speak to the entire person. I commend Steve Mathewson as a thoughtful guide to help us get a handle on the great stories of the Bible. I also commend him as a preacher who provides some very able leads on how to effectively communicate these stories to modern listeners.

Haddon W. Robinson

2002 by Steven D. Mathewson

 The art of preaching Old Testament Narrative

TIPS FOR SPENDING AN HOUR IN PRAYER - Unknown Source

 TIPS FOR SPENDING AN HOUR IN PRAYER

Quiet your heart before God. (5 minutes)

Take a few silent moments to focus on God and remember who he is.

“Among the gods there is none like you, O Lord; no deeds can compare with yours.

All the nations you have made will come and worship before you, Oh, Lord;

they will bring glory to your name.

For you are great and do marvelous deeds; you alone are God.”

(Ps. 86:8-10)

Ask God to prepare and purify your heart. (5 minutes)

Ask God to show any sin in your heart.

“Surely the arm of the LORD is not too short to save, nor his ear too dull to hear.

But your iniquities have separated you from your God; your sins have hidden his face from you,

So that he will not hear you.” (Is. 59:1-2)

“The prayer of a righteous man is powerful and effective.” (Ja. 5:16)

Speak of the wonders of God. (5 minutes)

Take a few minutes to declare the glory of God and the wonders of his character.

“The LORD is gracious and compassionate, slow to anger and rich in love.

The LORD is good to all; he has compassion on all he has made.

All you have made will praise you, O LORD; your saints will extol you.

They will tell of the glory of your kingdom and speak of your might, so that all men may know of your mighty acts and the glorious splendor of your kingdom.
My mouth will speak in praise of the LORD.

Let every creature praise his holy name for ever and ever.” (Ps. 145:8-12, 21)

Listen. (5-10 minutes)

Ask God to impress upon you what needs he wants you to bring before him.

“Guard your steps when you go to the house of God.

Go near to listen rather than to offer the sacrifice of fools….” (Ec. 5:1)

“Speak, Lord for your servant is listening.” (1Sam. 3:9)

Present petitions before the Lord. (25-30 minutes)

Join with others across the globe offering up specific prayers and petitions on behalf of the You People.

“Again I till you that if two of you on earth agree about anything you ask,

it will be done for you by my father in heaven.” Mt. 18:19

Thank God for his answers. (5 minutes)

In anticipation of what God will do, thank him for the privilege of bringing requests to him and for his promised answers. Rejoice also in knowing that eternal victory has been promised.

“The Lord is near. Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your request to God.” (Ph. 4:6)

“And I…am about to come and gather all nations and tongues, and they will come and see my glory.

I will set a sign among them, and I will send some of those…to the distant lands that have not heard of my fame or seen my glory. They will proclaim my glory among the nations.

And they will bring all your brothers, from all the nations, to my holy mountain in Jerusalem

as an offering to the LORD—on horses, in chariots and wagons, and on mules and camels,”

says the LORD.” (Is. 66:18-20)

The Adventure of Life - Wilfred Thomason Grenfell

It was in London, when I was first on my own allowance, and free from any supervision of body or mind, that I discovered that mental activities offered a chance for adventure as real and as worthy as any physical field. There I began to appreciate the value of knowledge because it enabled one to do things. When in the operating theatre I watched men familiarly and with confidence achieving magnificent results in relieving pain, prolonging life, and re-storing capacities by their masterly mental qualifications, life seemed suddenly to loom up ten times as attractive as I had ever dreamed it could be. But there was a larger realm of thought which no one could fully comprehend. Many of my teachers were men with wide reputations, who were to me almost as demigods, but among them there was a vast difference of opinion on this subject. Some were silent, and all were reticent regarding it.

The ordinary exponents of the Christian faith had never succeeded in interesting me in any way, or even in making me believe that they were more than professionally concerned themselves. Religion appeared to be a profession, exceedingly conventional, and most unattractive in my estimation, the very last I should have thought of selecting. I considered it effeminate, and should have strongly resented the imputation, and felt heartily ashamed, if any one of my companions had suggested that I was a pietist. I am not excusing my position: I am stating it. I made an exception of the home religion of my mother, which I simply put in a category by itself.

I was attracted one day by the excitement of an enormous crowd outside a tent. I was living at that time in Whitechapel, in the sordid purlieus of which the famous Jack the Ripper was contemporaneously carrying on his profession. One saw every kind of evil, and every variety of wrecked humanity, but among many vanquished, some victors. The fight between good and evil in the individual was always an evident fact. It never occurred to me that I must at some time, willy-nilly, enter consciously into the same arena. I went into the tent, and there I heard a plain common-sense man talking in a plain intelligible way to a huge congregation of really interested people. 

The man made me feel in all he said that at least he had thrown every ounce of himself into the issue. In a most matter-of-fact but kindly way, he pulled up a long-winded prayer-bore, who was irritating the audience with droning platitudes, and the Almighty by conferring quite unnecessary information upon him. He even cut short the choir and braved the organist, when he realized that their silence helped more than their art. He ended with an address, the simplicity of which left no doubt in any man's mind that he was a fighter for the practical issues of a better and more cheerful life on earth, a believer in a possible life of big achievement for every soul of us, both here and hereafter. His . . . .  appeal for help left a determination in my heart at least. Perhaps I had been wrong in considering the main object of the preaching profession to be preferment rather than social uplift. It was a revelation, it opened a new vision, and I guessed for the first time the meaning in the eyes of the knights of chivalry in familiar famous pictures. Somehow religion as an insurance ticket had never interested me. The selfishness and even cowardice of that appeal, to which I had so often listened, now loomed up in the worse light of distrust. That which I had called faith was after all unfaith. The new faith which there dawned on me for the first time was not the conviction that God would forgive me, but that he had already given me things of which I had not even known; not that he would save me, but that he would use me. I went out with yet a third field for adventure before me, and far the largest, to add to the glory and beauty of life. 

A new factor which now forced itself upon me was my will. I believed in free will: it seemed common sense. I knew that materialists did not, and that most of my comrades believed in Darwin and Huxley, 

and in the teaching that we are all slaves of unbreakable laws. I believed that I was at the fork of two roads, and could go down the one which I liked. For my venture I wanted knowledge. At that time I thought nothing of reading just as late at night as I could stay awake with a wet towel round my head; but I recognized limits to my capacity. I was forced to admit that there were some things too high for me. And yet — I must go ahead. Only thus will any man find his field for adventure. Courage and every noble virtue, and every idea of the romantic, worthwhile world in which I live would be gone, if I did not believe in free will. "After all, it is not that we strive to do the impossible, but that which to the self of mere experience looks impossible." 

 . . . 

I decided I would prefer and therefore would try to follow the Christ. 

What is the explanation of the biased or even bitter spirit in which many men deal with the claim of Christianity to their attention? In medicine and in all other branches of science we are at best supposed 

to bring our problems to the bar of our intelligence, without a bias for proving or disproving, but simply told the truth. I have had men come in the middle of the night, come many miles, incur[ing] considerable expense, just to discuss prolonging the life of a patient, who had no more claim on them than that he was a fellow man in distress. Their sole desire was to get wisdom for action, and they considered it a mean thing to worry one iota about the trouble involved in the attempt to prolong mortal 

life. The very men who strain at gnats when it is a question of real life, swallow a camel when it relates to mere animal existence. 

Among other odd things which struck one with regard to the acceptance of Christianity as a method of life was the fact that the people to decry it most loudly as a remedy were those who had never tried it at 

all. The loudest denouncers of a remedy for the body should be those who have tried it without prejudice and found it a failure. It is considered unscientific and irrational for a man to do more than remain silent about a remedy he has not tried personally. If, however, he were to form his opinion by watching others try it, it would be equally unscientific to judge of the experiment unless he were assured it was the unadulterated remedy he was seeing used. Those who have studied Christ's own teachings for themselves, and seen his varied methods tried for humanity's sins and sorrows, have never been disappointed. Most of us must find God, if at all, in the experiences of everyday life. 

One cause is almost alone enough to justify and quite sufficient to explain the attitude of mind in which men of science approach the Christian religion. For the claim of priest and theologian and religious teacher of succeeding ages, that their particular faith was knowledge and included absolute truth, was as demonstrably false as it was immodest. "Truth cannot exist in a church any more than learning can in a university." Again, their ceaseless attempts to stereotype the intellectual and social relation of every man of all ages according to their own conception of what the religion of Christ called for has patently held back the true advance of the race. They captured the title of the Christian Church, "vi et armis," just as a knight does the token from his adversary's helm, and arrested the growth of the real church, till 

it became like a miserable stunted cretin, for whom for centuries no cure was thought possible. Moreover, they enforced their tenets in a way well calculated to leave objectionable impressions on the minds of scientists, even if they did escape the experience of Galileo. No wonder that, as McComb says: "People are weary of the burden of theological doctrines, and are asking for something permanent, something verifiable in experience, which no criticism can touch and no progress in culture wither."  A young German divine is re- 

ported to have said, "Christ came to save us from the theologians!"