All Scripture is breathed out by God

Posted by ∙ ∙ In Devotion/Teaching ∙ , , ,

All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work. 2 Timothy 3:16–17, ESV

I receive numerous comments on the posts on this blog that never see the light of day because those who post them either do not bother to follow the rules clearly posted, which are assiduously enforced, or they have failed to read them. Their error is that they they attack what is posted here from Sacred Scripture as truth, in context, clearly exposited and exegeted with innuendo, human philosophy, but never, I repeat, never do they go to God’s Word and make any attempt to show me where I have erred in my exegesis of the text.

In fact, I can’t remember anyone ever doing that since this blog has been online, but I have had more attempts than I can remember to protest and derail the truth from God’s Word from the humanistic platform of outrage that God is Sovereign and they are not. One hot topic has always been the fact that Sacred Scripture is the inspired Word of God and that makes it infallible and inerrant.

But what makes it so abhorrent to those who insist on protesting, it also means that the truths it presents are God’s truths and that our Sovereign God is going to hold all outside of the Body of Christ accountable to His Law and are, therefore, liable to His wrath. They, therefore, hate God’s truth and resist it as such hoping, I suppose, that this will somehow remove their liability.

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Southern Baptists unanimously affirm Biblical sexuality, oppose ‘transgenderism’

Posted by ∙ ∙ In News ∙

According to the Christian News Network:

Southern Baptist leaders voted overwhelmingly on Tuesday to affirm the biblical model of human sexuality, agreeing that gender identity is solely determined by biological sex and not by ‘one’s self-perception.’

As previously reported, church representatives at the annual Southern Baptist Convention in Baltimore considered a number of items for discussion this week, including the topic of gender identity. While many claim that a person’s gender can differ from one’s sexuality, the Southern Baptists declared just the opposite in a resolution titled “On Transgender Identity.”

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University ordered to pay over $710,000 for discriminating against Christian professor

Posted by ∙ ∙ In News

Christian News Network reports:

A university in North Carolina has been ordered to pay over $710,000 in attorney’s fees for discriminating against a Christian professor in denying him a promotion because of his beliefs.

As previously reported, Mike Adams works as a professor of criminology in the Department of Sociology and Criminal Justice at the University of North Carolina-Wilmington. Adams, a former atheist, was hired in 1993, and became an associate professor in 1998.

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You cannot serve God and money

Posted by ∙ ∙ In Devotion/Teaching

When you sit down to eat with a ruler, observe carefully what is before you, and put a knife to your throat if you are given to appetite. Do not desire his delicacies, for they are deceptive food. Do not toil to acquire wealth; be discerning enough to desist. When your eyes light on it, it is gone, for suddenly it sprouts wings, flying like an eagle toward heaven. Proverbs 23:1–5, ESV

The god of the natural man is self. Worship of self revolves around self-gratification. This idolatry is enhanced in a consumer driven economy such as in the United States. The “visible church” is not immune. From pastors like Steven Furtick becoming so wealthy that he can build a huge 16,000 square foot mansion to Mark Driscoll and his elders forcing all of the leaders in his church to sign non-compete agreements that if they leave that church for whatever reason they cannot start a new church or even become part of an existing church within a certain square mile radius of any of the Mars Hills campuses. These things are the fruit of “ministries” that are focused primarily on the “bottom line.” If you keep these things in mind then you must understand that how these ministers and those like them “minister” to their “flocks” is all designed to keep the money flowing in.

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Oprah Winfrey now playing god?

Posted by ∙ ∙ In Opinion

Apprising Ministries brings you the latest on the upcoming movie The Shack and shows you why Oprah, who’s as “Christian” as DeePak Chopra, playing god in the movie is actually consistent with her religious belief system.

Do yourself a favor, stay away from the spiritual shanty shack.

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The things of the Spirit of God are only discerned spiritually

Posted by ∙ ∙ In Devotion/Teaching ∙

The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned. 1 Corinthians 2:14, ESV

When the Word of God ceases to be the plumb line of one’s faith, walk, understanding of truth, and knowing God then what replaces it is human reason which, outside of the Grace of God, is completely unable to know God’s truth when it sees it. There seems to be a large number professing Christians who raise a protest when I teach on doctrine. Their contention is that they simply refuse to believe that what I am teaching is the truth.

Upon what do they base this? It is all based within their own reasoning. Never do I receive a clear Biblical indictment against the truths I share. Instead, the protests are couched in feelings, human reason, common sense, or philosophy. My brethren, we must not flinch from these protests. God’s truth is knowable because the Holy Spirit imparts divine wisdom to His children for this purpose. Never forget, it is falsehood that cannot stand scrutiny. The truth has nothing to fear from deep examination, therefore, let us defend it in the power of the Holy Spirit.

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Truth-telling and homosexuality

Posted by ∙ ∙ In Opinion ∙

“If ever there was a subject which is almost universally surrounded in falsehoods, deception and misinformation,” says apologist and ethicist Bill Muehlenberg, “it is the topic of homosexuality.”

According to Muehlenberg. the liberal media will not challenge the dangerous homosexual lifestyle for fear of reprisals from the powerful and well-financed homosexual lobby. But there’s hope! Muehlenberg believes that the truth will eventually come out due largely to a few “brave voices being raised” who refuse to cave in to gay activist’s threats and intimidation. We learn the names of four of them in this piece.

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Whose sins are forgiven and why?

Posted by ∙ ∙ In Devotion/Teaching ∙

εἶπεν δὲ αὐτῇ· ἀφέωνταί σου αἱ ἁμαρτίαι. καὶ ἤρξαντο οἱ συνανακείμενοι λέγειν ἐν ἑαυτοῖς· τίς οὗτός ἐστιν ὃς καὶ ἁμαρτίας ἀφίησιν; Luke 7:48–49, NA28

And he said to her, “Your sins have been forgiven.” And the ones reclining with him began saying among themselves, “Who is this who even forgives sins?” Luke 7:48–49, translated from the NA28 Greek text

In Luke 7:36–50, there are three main characters. There is our Lord Jesus Christ, Simon the Pharisee, and an unnamed woman who is referred to in v. 37 and v. 39 simply as ἁμαρτωλός (hamartōlos), “sinful, sinner.” The events in this passage take place at a meal in Simon’s home and there are others reclining at the table with them. The unnamed woman is uninvited.

These events take place in Galilee immediately after John the Baptist’s disciples have come to our Lord on his bequest to confirm whether Jesus is indeed the Messiah. He then shows the Pharisee’s hypocrisy in vv. 31–35 for rejecting John the Baptist even though he lived in rigid abstinence even though they demanded that of our Lord while the message preached by both was the same. Then in v. 36 one of these Pharisees, Simon, invites Jesus to eat with him.

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The Bible is what God uses to communicate to His people

Posted by ∙ ∙ In Devotion/Teaching ∙

Since Possessing the Treasure has existed I would say that a very large percentage of the “debate” we have dealt with here has been whether the Bible is God’s Word or simply another book. Of course, related to that, would be the doctrine of Sola Scriptura. The genuine Christian does accept the Bible as Sacred Scripture and a huge part of God’s revelation of Himself to them.

Those professing Christians who decry this, however, insist that knowledge of God must be derived from non-communicative ‘encounters’ with Him, that is, through experiences of one kind or another. The problem with this should be obvious. If we hold to the truth that God’s revelation of Himself to us is primarily through the Bible as His verbal self-testimony then we are dependent upon it as unchanging and complete truth.

However, if we hold that God communicates to us primarily via experience then there is no foundation. Truth becomes arbitrary and subjective.

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God’s sovereignty and His perfect knowledge of man

Posted by ∙ ∙ In Devotion/Teaching ∙

O Lord, you have searched me and known me! You know when I sit down and when I rise up; you discern my thoughts from afar. You search out my path and my lying down and are acquainted with all my ways. 4 Even before a word is on my tongue, behold, O Lord, you know it altogether. Psalms 139:1–4, ESV

Our God is beyond our understanding. Thankfully, He has revealed Himself to us, to a degree, in His Word. Those who claim to serve Him, but treat His Word as if it was not important, or refuse to submit to the truths therein are fools. That has always puzzled me about those who take a sliver of God’s Word, misinterpret it, and then build massive man-cenetered doctrines around their misinformation. Have they no fear of God?

God is Omniscient, Omnipresent, and Omnipotent. He knows all, is everywhere at once, and is all-powerful. He is Sovereign! Those who play games with Christianity must have no understanding of this for if they did, they would not dare trifle with God Almighty!

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All in Christ should be longing for their eternal body

Posted by ∙ ∙ In Devotion/Teaching ∙

I think it right, as long as I am in this body, to stir you up by way of reminder, since I know that the putting off of my body will be soon, as our Lord Jesus Christ made clear to me. 2 Peter 1:13–14, ESV

Unlike Peter, the Lord has not made it clear to me the putting off of my body will be soon (see the passage above). However, I do not deny that my desire for the ending of this tabernacling in this earthly tent grows deeper with each skirmish or battle in the Truth War.

However, over the last few years as I have witnessed the growing darkness in American culture and the corresponding apostasy in the “visible church” my focus has been more and more on the eternal. This, of course, leads to much joy because my life is lived more and more from a heavenly perspective even when experiencing much resistance from those who hate God’s truth.

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Jesus Christ is the express image of God

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In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. John 1:1–2, ESV

I heard a sermon a long time ago in which the preacher defined a cult as any religious group that called itself Christian but denied the orthodox doctrine of our Triune God. That means that those who deny the Doctrine of the Trinity, according to that definition, are not Christians, but heretics.

The man-centered part of each of us, that is the flesh, rebels from such a strict “legalistic” view, but as our faith becomes more and more God Centered in all its aspects, that view becomes entirely justified in our hearts because as we come to know God as He reveals Himself to His children, we will not doubt His Word nor will we attempt to overlay His truth with “altered” truth nor will we add to it nor subtract from it nor take it out of context in order to make it more man centered.

If we compromised and did those things we would do so in order to become more acceptable to the majority and not be excluded and hated by the world and those who call themselves Christians, but who are really just part of the fallen world system.

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Do not judge by appearances, but judge with right judgment

Posted by ∙ ∙ In Devotion/Teaching

“Do not judge by appearances, but judge with right judgment.” John 7:24, ESV

What is the definition of the English word “fact?” The following is from the Merriam Webster Online Dictionary:

fact noun \ˈfakt\

Full Definition of FACT

1: a thing done: as a obsolete : feat b : crime <accessory after the fact> c archaic : action

2 archaic : performance, doing

3 : the quality of being actual : actuality <a question of fact hinges on evidence>


4 a : something that has actual existence <space exploration is now a fact> b : an actual occurrence <prove the fact of damage>


5 : a piece of information presented as having objective reality — in fact: in truth

Origin of FACT

Latin factum, from neuter of factus, past participle of facere

First Known Use: 15th century

The part that says, “a piece of information presented as having objective reality” is where I would like to concentrate in this post. I am a firm believer that there is something called absolute truth. Also, there exist truths that are objective. These are facts.

On the other hand, there is information that is subjective in nature that is presented as if it has objective reality when actually this is not so because there is nothing objective behind the “proof.” For instance, there are times when I use a form of the word “purpose” in what I write to convey a truth of God “purposing” to do something or that as Christians we should purpose in our hearts to obey the Lord, et cetera because these are found in Sacred Scripture.

However, there are some who would attempt to make the case that this is “Purpose Driven” language and this “proves” that I have become compromised and am now a disciple of Rick Warren. I contend that this type of thinking is what our Lord was referring to in John 7:24 about judging by appearances.

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The wisdom of Rick Warren: Purpose Driven Catholics

Posted by ∙ ∙ In Opinion

For years now Warren has been actively working to assist Roman Catholic parishes in luring people away from the historic orthodox Christian faith and into apostate Roman Catholicism.

Apprising Ministries documents for you some of this ongoing apostasy of a man whom the Southern Baptist Convention has just rewarded with a prime position from which to teach its pastors at the upcoming SBC pastors convention.

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Glenn Beck goes off on “religious people”

Posted by ∙ ∙ In Opinion ∙ ,

Marsha West, correspondent for the Christian Research Network, informs us of controversial conservative Glenn Beck’s convocation speech at evangelical Liberty University (LU) where he took to the podium and gave a sermon laced with Mormon theology.

When Beck learned that a large number of Christians, including some LU donors, came out in protest, he became outraged and used his position as a popular TV/radio host and his news outlet, The Blaze, as a bully pulpit to go after his critics.

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I have not come to bring peace, but a sword

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“Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I have not come to bring peace, but a sword.” Matthew 10:34, ESV

The character and the mission of our Lord Jesus Christ is not well understood by the majority of people on planet Earth. In fact, many professing “Christians” have an image of Him in their understanding that is based upon fleshly reasoning.

This “other” Jesus is not Biblical for the most part. They have given their Jesus a whole new set of values and traits that conflict sharply with the Jesus presented in the Gospels in His own words. In fact, many of their attributes of “their Jesus” come directly from how he is portrayed in pop culture.

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There’s no third way

Posted by ∙ ∙ In Opinion ∙ ,

Dr. Albert Mohler, president of Baptist Theological Seminary, expresses his concern that, when it comes to the sin of homosexuality, more and more churches are bending to political correctness by declaring that the Church must accept practicing homosexuals.

Dr. Mohler reminds us that:

A church will either believe and teach that same-sex behaviors and relationships are sinful, or it will affirm them. Eventually, every congregation in America will make a public declaration of its position on this issue. It is just a matter of time (and for most churches, not much time) before every congregation in the nation faces this test.

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