Tag: God

Apologetics · Theology

Young Earther and Proud.

Bob Snyder4 Comments

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The Earth simply is not as old as scientist think it is.  I don’t fall in to the thinking of, “it was created with the appearance of age.”  I think the time/space distortion of creation best explains the concept, that from our point of view looking back at the point of origin it seems to be and for some purposes is old, but looking out from the point of origin it has only been 6000 +or -.   We can not perceive time the way God does.  He made time.  He is not subject to it.  It is subject to Him and so is space.  If you move a prop through water it causes cavitation which is a distortion.  inside the distortion sound travels at a different rate than it does outside the distortion.  This is a bad analogy, but you get the idea.  cavitation-matter-creation

The creation and placing of things at a rate faster than the speed of light causes distortions with time and space.  I agree with the Bible that the Earth is young.  We just think it is older looking from our point of view.  Kind of like the jog wheel on a VCR playing a video of the life of a tree.  The seed is not, it is, it is a sapling, it is a tree, it is a house, it is not, all in one instance to God.  We are very linear minded beings.  His ways are higher than ours.  For us to doubt His word because we don’t get it is wrong.

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Don’t Use Pot, Even If This Godless World Makes It Legal!!!

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We all know the pot-head holiday is this month. We will see lots of idiotic articles crying for the legalization of pot for its many alleged benefits. Here are a couple of things to consider; 1) The Bible says to be of sober mind. This is so you can actively fight against sin and temptation in your life. 2) pot is sinful because it is a purely selfish and debasing thing to do. Getting high is no different than being a drunk. 3) Drugs like that are specifically referred to as, “magic, sorcery, enchantment” in the Bible. We are told to stay far away from them.

So go ahead and listen to the liberal, idiotic, Satan worshiping, masses of the left, and follow them to your own personal destruction, while hurting everyone you love because, you are a lackadaisical do nothing, or listen to God in His word. Stand up and be a real man worth remembering and looking up to as a good Christian man emulating Christ to the world.

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Pot robs a man of his ambition. All the benefits of pot can be utilized without the smoking it or using the hemp that will get you high. The THC can be put in a pill form with uniform dosage. There is absolutely no need for you to smoke it other than your own selfish desire to get high.

 

(1 Corinthians 15:34 NASB) Become sober-minded as you ought, and stop sinning; for some have no knowledge of God. I speak this to your shame.
(1 Peter 5:8 NASB) Be of sober spirit, be on the alert. Your adversary, the devil, prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour.

(Galatians 5:19 NASB) Now the deeds of the flesh are evident, which are: immorality, impurity, sensuality,

(Galatians 5:20 NASB) idolatry, sorcery, enmities, strife, jealousy, outbursts of anger, disputes, dissensions, factions,

(Galatians 5:21 NASB) envying, drunkenness, carousing, and things like these, of which I forewarn you, just as I have forewarned you, that those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.

http://www.marchofdimes.com/pregnancy/marijuana.aspx

http://youtu.be/PtecjlZHXS4

Church · Church Reviews

Update for the First Baptist Church of Fruitland

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My family and I attended their, “5th Sunday” service on the 30th.  We all had a sweet time of fellowship and worship.  We picked songs from the hymnals in alphabetical order.  We shared attributes of God that began with the letter we were on.  It was the best time of worship in song that we have had in a while.  All of the Church visiting has left us with a bad taste in our mouths when it comes to what passes as worship songs.  The good ol’ hymns are good for a reason.  The deep meaning and theology conveyed by them brings our heads and hearts together in our worship of the Lord.

 

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“Hey song writers! Are you listening?”

 

 

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Repentance, granted by God.

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Repentance granted by God

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So imagine you are in a dark room.  You have two actual options to choose from.  You are only aware of one.  The one you are aware of is in front of you, dimly lit.  The other, is covered under a black box.  You are not aware of its existence.  How can you choose an option you are not aware exists?  If you are a slave to sin, and not regenerate, you are like the person in the dark room.  You choose what you have chosen, and you do it over and over again.  If you are going to be saved, God makes the other option evident to you.

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It is as if, He removes the box, and shines a bright light on the other option.  In so doing, you realize it is far superior.  The other actual option you were reveling in is realy like; vomit, feces, and maggots.  In revulsion you cast it down.  You vigorously whip your hands back and forth in disgust.  The realization of what you had once loved, and called good, is so disgusting, in light of the truth, that you can’t believe you loved it.  You flee to the truth of God, as fast as you can, with reckless abandon, throwing yourself at the foot of the cross, seeing it’s beauty for the first time.

Theology

Omnipresent

Bob Snyder4 Comments

Omnipresent, is the quality of being present in all places.  God is omnipresent.  God is the creator of everything.  He keeps everything from being destroyed.  He makes the natural laws that we rely on to make sense of our world.  Not only does He make those laws, He also keeps them enforce.  God exists independent of the creation.  Time and space are part of the His creation.  He is not.

God is not, some unconscious universal force that permeates everything like what the pantheists believe.  His presence is not, limited to any one time or space.  He can specifically reveal Himself during a time, in a specific location, without ceasing to exist above all time and space.

Here is something we have heard Christians say from time to time, “Yeah man, like… God is everywhere…  He is in the trees, the rocks, the water, and in us.”   This in something a pantheist would say.  We as Christians are not pantheists.  A pantheist believes that God is literally permeating everything, and that everything, collectively is God.  Kind of like the force from Star Wars.

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God is present in all places, even Hell.  He will pour out His wrath on sinners in Hell for all eternity.  God is present to the person in the deepest, darkest, cave in the most remote mountains.  He is present to the drowning person in the ocean.  He is present, not because He is in them, and they are collectively Him, but rather He is above all things, in all things, and outside of them.  It speaks to His sovereign will.  He is present as a matter of His will, not due to it being in bondage to the creation, but because of His lordship over it.

Don’t be confused by what I just said.  “How can God be outside of creation and in it at the same time?” you ask.  In the sense that He is not bound by His creation, or subject to it, He transcends it.  This is what is meant by He is outside of it.  Of course to be everywhere He would need to be, well… everywhere, and He is.  It is that He is sovereign, and transcendent.  I hope this makes it clear

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Omniscience

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Omniscience is the quality of having all knowledge.  The word comes from two words, “omni” meaning, “all” and, “science” meaning, “knowledge.”  In the Christian faith we believe God to be omniscient.  He is the creator of all things.  This includes knowledge.  Whatever can be known by man is only knowable because God has created it and given revelation of it to us, as well as the ability to perceive it and understand it.  There is nothing that God does not know.  This includes all things past, present, and future.

Some people don’t like the idea of an, “all-knowing God.”  This idea threatens their sense of self-originating will and free agency.  The idea, that God knows who will be saved, and who will not be saved, before He creates them, seems to them to be an offense.  They object on the basis of God’s love.  They say, “If God is love He wouldn’t make a man knowing he was destined to Hell.”  What they miss is that all men since the fall are destined for Hell.  We don’t deserve anything good.  We deserve death, and Hell.  This simple truth escapes them.  They don’t see man as depraved sinners, corrupted through and through by sin.

I however, should take comfort in the omniscience of a sovereign and eternal God.  The fact that He knows everything gives me great peace.  I can trust Him in His complete, perfect knowledge.  He, knowing everything and ordaining all things by His will, comforts me.  I can sit by and not worry, because in Him is the primacy of His will and deity which by His nature is goodness and love for those that are in Him.

Theology

Theology

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Doing-theology1Theology

Theology is a Greek word that means, “The study of God.”  The first part of the word is, “Theo” from, “Theos” (Θεός) which is Greek for god.  The second part of the word is, “logy” from the Greek word, “logia” (λογία) which means, “The study of.”  So to the Christian the word, “theology” specifically is the study of God.  This is different for the lost person.  They look at theology as a study of some deity that may or may not exist.  In the secular world there are colleges and universities that have classes teaching this, dare I say, “Study of god.”  Their sources are like ours, as far as many of the texts go, but they don’t know the true God, and as such study Him with incorrect presuppositions.  It is imperative that Christians start with proper presuppositions.

First and foremost, is that God is the originator of all things, known and unknown to us.  This includes what can be learned.  All knowledge comes from the LORD.  Our ability to reason, use logic, remember, recall, convey, communicate and feel all comes from God.  We would not be able to know anything if He did not will it to be.  This seems basic, but there are books of theology that never assert this truth.  Think about this for a moment.  What does a tree know of God?  What does a child know of God?  What does a lost person know of God?  What do you know of God?  Read through those questions again and ponder the implications of each one of them, replace the, “what” with, “how.”  God is a communicative Creator.  We know this by His inclusion of the attributes essential to communication being integral to our faith and existence.  Without those attributes we could not know God the way He intended.  He planned to give us the progressive revelation of His word, in the form of the Bible.  He planned for us to be able to write, read, and relay the knowledge of Him and His good message.  We can know Christ the eternal God through what is written therein.   So it is supremely important that we ascribe God the Creator, primacy in originating all things, including theology.

We must not ascribe attributes to God that He Himself does not affirm in His word.  This would be a very dangerous endeavor.  We would be making a god for ourselves, which is not the same as the true God who reigns supreme over all creation.  Idolatry is, and has been, an insidious and cancerous evil.  It substitutes a counterfeit god who cannot save us.  The attributes or perfections of God that are taught in His word reveal to us the things that can be known by us of Him.  Let us study theology then, in true faith and repentance, humbly approaching the feet of God, giver of all things.

Theology

Justice is restorative to the victims, and punitive to the offender.

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Justice is restorative to the victims, and punitive to the offender.   All of us, before salvation are offenders. That is the part people skip. They think they are pretty good, and don’t deserve hell, like the Bible says they do. We deserve death and hell, every single one of us.  We are all sinners.  Those that God made, even knowing they would reject Him naturally will suppress the truth in unrighteousness.  (Romans 1:18-22) So if we all deserve hell, it is a miracle that God saves any.  God didn’t need to do anything.  He chose to create and demonstrate His loving kindness.   How can a fallen creature look upon its Creator, who perfectly defines all things by His very existence, and have the impudence to judge Him as evil? It is ludicrous.  Creations have no rights to their Creator.  He has all rights to what He has made.  God demonstrates His justice, by pouring out the rightfully deserved wrath, on the unrepentant sinners, in Hell for all eternity. This brings glory to God, because in punishing sin, He restores the victims. The victims are the people who have repented and put their faith in the grace of Jesus and His atoning work on the cross. The offense caused by sin would mar God if He did not punish it. The believers would be victims of this, if God did not punish the unbelievers.  They would be victims, because God would be unjust and unloving to not punish the unbelievers in Hell for all eternity.  So the wrath poured out on the offender restores that what would be done to the believer, by demonstrating that God is, in fact just, and will not let sin go unpunished. The fact that He is just, and restores those He has no need or obligation to restore, shows that He is also loving and merciful. God didn’t have to make anyone. He was perfect without creating a thing, but He did create, because He desired to do so. He is omniscient.  So in His all knowledge, if He creates people, knowing which ones will not repent, and knowing which ones will repent, and even still creating them all demonstrates that some vessels were made for wrath, and others honorable purposes.  Read Romans 9 for crying out loud people.  For those of you that claim to be Christian, READ YOUR BIBLE!!!  If He chose to do this then it is good because He defines good.  He is the creator.  We are the creatures.  Saying He is evil because He judges and punishes creatures He made, knowing they would be in rebellion demonstrates how little you actually know about your Bible and God.  You have believed the horrible Barney theology of, I love you, you love me nonsense.  Open theists and Universalists shouldn’t even call themselves Christian.  They are heretics.

So God is glorified in damnation by demonstrating His wrath for the purpose of His justice and He is glorified in salvation by demonstrating His grace for the purpose of His loving kindness.  This grace is not a violation of justice because He came down from majesty incarnate as Jesus to suffer the cross.  He had the wrath that you and I deserve poured out on Him on our behalf.  He paid the penalty and satisfied justice so that you could be saved if you would repent and put your faith in Him.  If you can’t then He didn’t die for you and you are not saved.  You are not one of the elect and will be in hell for all eternity.

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Marital Love

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Marital Love

            When two people get married, usually they are in love.  This is true for Christians and the lost.  What happens when one person stops being in love with the other?  However this comes about, let’s assume that it has happened.  In a marriage of lost people, what is there to keep them together?  Once the one spouse realizes the other is no longer in love with them, why should they stay?  Why would anyone want to stay in a marriage where they are not cherished and loved?  There might be some pragmatic reasons like, convenience, money, or children.  Some people will stick it out just for these reasons.  What is the point of all of that if you don’t have the love of your spouse?  You might as well be living on your own, looking for someone to share love with.

Nobody gets married, thinking that one day they won’t be in love anymore.  People get married to share their love and lives together.  So what happens to a Christian couple when one of them stops feeling in love with the other?  The same thing happens to them, that happens to a lost couple.  About half the time they get divorced.  The others stay married out of pragmatic reasons or some sense of duty or obligation.

How should it be with a Christian couple?  What should the spouse do that has found out their spouse isn’t in love with them anymore?  What should the spouse do that doesn’t feel in love anymore?  Should they divorce and look for someone to be in love with?  Should they stick together because of duty, obligation, or their faith?  We know that God hates divorce.  We read about it in Malachi 2:16 “For the man who does not love his wife but divorces her, says the Lord, the God of Israel, covers his garment with violence, says the Lord of hosts. So guard yourselves in your spirit, and do not be faithless.”  So the Christian couple should stay together, but that doesn’t fix the problem.

They are not in love anymore.  Either both of them have no feelings for each other, or one of them has lost their feelings for the other.  How do we resolve this?  What does the bible say about love?  We read this about love and God’s love in 1 Corinthians 13:1-13, “1If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing.

Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.

Love never ends. As for prophecies, they will pass away; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will pass away. For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but when the perfect comes, the partial will pass away. When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I gave up childish ways. For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known.

So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love.”

How pointless is life without love?  The love of Jesus for us, the love we should have for each other is explained in the cross of Christ.  In 1 John 4:7-13 we read this, “Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God. Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love.  In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him.  In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, God abides in us and his love is perfected in us. By this we know that we abide in him and he in us, because he has given us of his Spirit.”  Are we starting to get the picture?

Maybe they are not in love anymore because one or both of them feel like they have been wronged or victimized?  If so, they are holding on to hurt feelings and resentment.  Healing of their marriage can’t happen until they forgive each other.  In Matthew 6:15 we read, “but if you do not forgive others their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.”  Ephesians 4:31-31, “Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you, along with all malice.  Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you.”

We know that in a marriage there are two sinners living together.  Sins are bound to happen.  One of them will sin against the other and the other might sin back or sin in the way of harboring a grudge, hurt feelings, or resentment.  If these things are left undealt with they will keep coming up to cause problems.  Both people must repent.  Sometimes one person believes they never did anything wrong.  They think, “It is all the other persons fault, I don’t need to repent.  What could I have possible done wrong?  They are the one who hurt me!”  Most of the time, both people are thinking the same thing.  This is why both need to repent and ask not only God to forgive them, but they have to ask for forgiveness from the other.  When you humble yourself and come to someone asking them for something that they can give or deny it takes the power away from you.  You are at their mercy.  Hopefully you have a truly saved spouse who can see their own sin and grant you their forgiveness because of how much they have been forgiven by Christ.

Even still, while you are living in this torment you can’t give up.  As Christians you aren’t allowed to stop loving your spouse just because they aren’t in love with you anymore.  Oh, you might want to.  You might even feel yourself beginning to resent them as you put yourself on the throne of your life.  You might hear, “You poor, poor person you…  You don’t deserve to be treated like that by them!  How dare they!  Don’t they know how good they’ve got it with you?  You’ll teach them!  You’ll leave, and then what will they do?”  So you like what sin is telling you?

Do you want to be on the pitty pot?  You have failed to remember that you are the worst kind of sinner.  Christ bled and died for your sins.  Romans 5:8, “But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.”  1 John 4:10, “In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins.”  Jesus pursued us, our salvation, and the Father’s will, all the way to the cross and the grave.  How dare we give up on forgiving, loving, and repenting!

Sinners who don’t think that they have been loved the way they think they should be, you have been loved by Jesus in spite of your many sins against Him.  Your sins are responsible for His suffering on the cross.  You don’t deserve love!  You deserve death and Hell, being so self-centered, to think that you deserve to be treated with love from anyone is ludicrous.  Repent of your selfishness, ask Jesus to forgive you.  Ask your spouse to forgive you for not loving them selflessly, even if your love is not reciprocated.  Love them, while they are yet, not in love with you.  The only love you need is the love of Christ.  Pour yourself out for them the way Christ did for you, and Love them to the grave.  See your sins, and how much they cost Christ.  Look at your spouse, and see them for what they are.  They are a sinner, just like you, in need of The Saviors’ grace.  Demonstrate love and mercy towards them, because you have experienced the love and mercy of God.  Repent of harboring bitterness and forgive them.  Fill your heart with the love of God and then pour it out as a merciful balm of healing on your marriage.  Together, repent and be restored to each other and God.  God can make all things new, including your marriage.  You should know this, because when you were saved, He made you new.

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Peter do you love me?

Bob Snyder2 Comments

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Peter do you love me?

Something interesting, that I don’t remember thinking about before, is found in 1John 21:15-17.  My son Josh was visiting us.  He and I were talking, and he asked if I ever thought of what Jesus was doing when He was asking Peter if he loved Him?  You see, the first two times Jesus asks Peter if he loves Him, He uses the Greek word, “ἀγαπᾷς” it transliterates as, “agapas.”  It is a form of the word, “agape.”  I’ve always been told by people and Preachers that the word, “agape” means, God’s perfect, sacrificial love.  While looking the word up it seems there is more to it than that.  It also has implications of a willful, reasoned, self-volitional type of love.  We also see that this type of love is supposed to be reciprocated by us, to God, and we are supposed to love each other in the same way, in 2Matthew 22:37-39 when Jesus, in Greek uses the word, “Ἀγαπήσεις” or “Agapēseis.”

So why does Peter respond with the Greek word, “φιλῶ” which transliterates as, “philō.”  Philō implies a warm, brotherly love, the kind of love you would have for a very close friend.  So Peter is responding back with a more reserved, lesser type of love, than what Jesus is asking him about.  Keep in mind, this is after Peter had denied that he even knew Jesus, to save his own neck.  Jesus is fully aware of this, and what is going on in Peter’s heart.  One has to wonder, “What was going on in Peter’s mind after these questions from Jesus?”  I’m not going to make any assumptions here.  What we read in the Bible is enough.  It is just one of those things that I have wondered about.  I hope to find out one day.  I think I’ll pass this on to one of my more learned friends and see what they have to say.  I’ll get back to you all.  Maybe, they can comment on this article?

115So when they had finished breakfast, Jesus said to Simon Peter, “Simon, son of John, do you love Me more than these?” He said to Him, “Yes, Lord; You know that I love You.” He said to him, “Tend My lambs.”16He said to him again a second time, “Simon, son of John, do you love Me?” He said to Him, “Yes, Lord; You know that I love You.” He said to him, “Shepherd My sheep.”17He said to him the third time, “Simon, son of John, do you love Me?” Peter was grieved because He said to him the third time, “Do you love Me?” And he said to Him, “Lord, You know all things; You know that I love You.” Jesus said to him, “Tend My sheep.

2Matthew 22:37-39 (NASB) “…37And He said to him, “ ‘YOU SHALL LOVE THE LORD YOUR GOD WITH ALL YOUR HEART, AND WITH ALL YOUR SOUL, AND WITH ALL YOUR MIND.’38“This is the great and foremost commandment.39“The second is like it, ‘YOU SHALL LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR AS YOURSELF.’…”