NowTHINK!AboutIt

Avoiding Hackneyed...Making Sense

Jesus Death: Ugly And Beautiful At Once

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Everything God Does Says
I Love You

Some portions of Scripture are very pleasant to read and very popular.

Who doesn’t like Psalm 23. Even nonreligious people enjoy reading this passage and many can repeat it from memory.

We love to talk about God’s grace and the song “Amazing Grace” is still one of the most popular songs in the world.

We love to talk about the nativity. Pictures have been painted, scenes have been constructed and theatrical productions have been organized all of which depict the beautiful story of Jesus’ birth.

But there are other portions of Scripture we don’t enjoy so much. The last few chapters of each Gospel tell us about the death of Jesus and the reports don’t make very pleasant reading.

When Jesus died it was visually very ugly. His accusers were unfair, unreasonable and manipulative. His executioners were aggressive, violent, abusive and cruel and the Gospel writers recorded all of it in great detail.

The amount of time covered from His arrest to His death was at least fifteen hours, possibly longer, and the humiliation Jesus endured during that time was unspeakable. He was lied about, spit on, whipped, mocked with a crown of thorns and beaten so badly He couldn’t be recognized (Isaiah 52:14). Even His disciples forsook Him.

And because He knew what was coming, just before His arrest He agonized in prayer.

Most people, preferring romance or mystery to gore, shy away from this type of reading. But when it comes to the death of Jesus we should take another look. [Read more…] about Jesus Death: Ugly And Beautiful At Once

Jonathan Edwards Talked Hell, Promised No Heaven

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If people are condemned to hell without recourse, why torment them before they go.

When Edwards Described Hell
You Felt The Flames

I’m not sure what you would call it but the congregation’s response to Jonathan Edward’s famous sermon, Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God, was not a revival.

He wasn’t speaking to heretics, hecklers or blasphemers. In fact, his hearers weren’t even skeptical. They were regular congregants and they were anything but slack. They endured long, dry, complicated, and often irrelevant or condemning discussions on Bible topics every week.

Deadening, yes, but showing up every week was a sign of determined commitment. They weren’t indifferent.

The services were probably lifeless – the effect had to be numbing – but we can’t blame the attenders for that and there is no reason to accuse them of being spiritually casual.

Mr. Edwards was clearly a very intelligent man with a remarkable ability to articulate his thoughts. But in spite of these abilities those who heard him found his theology difficult to assimilate. [Read more…] about Jonathan Edwards Talked Hell, Promised No Heaven

Heaven Closed To Sow’s Ears!

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Jesus to Nicodemus
“You Must Be Born Again”

When Jesus made that statement, Nicodemus didn’t understand what He meant. I offer the following as an illustration of what it means and why it is so.

Sow’s Ears and Silk Purses

My mother said it, your mother said it and anyone with common sense knows the following statement is true…

You cannot turn a sow’s ear into a silk purse.

This maxim is recognized universally and is usually interpreted to mean:

  • Inferior materials can’t be used to make superior products.

But it also implies that…

  • The nature of two vastly different materials can never be the same.

One thing cannot become another: water can’t become oil, salt can’t become sugar, tree trunks don’t become steel, fat doesn’t convert to protein and so on.

And in the case of a sow’s ear there are no conditions under which that principle doesn’t apply: [Read more…] about Heaven Closed To Sow’s Ears!

Calvinism – Devil Doesn’t Believe It!

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Sinners are born sullied not senseless.

The Devil Thinks Calvinism
Is A Great Idea!

And why not? One of his tricks is to make people think they can’t get saved, so anything that encourages doubt works right into his hands.

But, even though he thinks Calvinism is a good idea he doesn’t believe it.

In case you’re not familiar with the tenets of Calvinism it is a philosophical concept – nothing theological about it, although some would argue otherwise – that says God selected certain people to be saved and consigned everyone else to hell. His choices were made in eternity past and are fixed. No appeals allowed.

Yes, if you are a thinking person the logical inference is any individual not chosen for salvation IS chosen for hell. Offensive thought, hey? Calvinists think so too and have responded with long drawn out discussions designed to camouflage the reality. They even came up with a term for it, “double election.”

Google it and read for yourself. One post admits to the offense and suggests ways to soften it, without admitting any error, of course. I won’t take time to explore it here.

But, getting back to my original thought, the Devil doesn’t buy it. Not only does he focus on EVERY person – not just the elect or non-elect – he also works to blind them all to the truth of the Gospel – a condition Calvinists suggest is already existing and is curable only by a special, mystical, enabling by God.

Instead, however, the Bible says the following: [Read more…] about Calvinism – Devil Doesn’t Believe It!

How Does God’s Sovereignty Work?

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Pharaoh was chosen for destruction in this life, not hell in the next.

Omnipotence And Sovereignty
Are Two Different Things

God was omnipotent before creation, He became sovereign afterward.

As Omnipotent, God possesses all power. As Sovereign He shares it.

“Sovereignty,” of course, implies relationship and is often defined in terms of control, i.e., how much control the Sovereign – in this case God – exerts over His subjects. Obviously, God as Sovereign has absolute authority – He is still all powerful – but He has chosen not to exercise that authority absolutely. Control is a part of the picture but only a part.

Omnipotence is power without limits, shape or application. God has always had “all power” but before creation it was only an unexpressed attribute. It couldn’t be measured, categorized or used by others. Before creation there was no one else to use it.

Designing and assembling the created order changed all that. Power management – sovereignty – became an issue after creation and it involves more than one person. In fact, it involves every person.

There are many power processes neglected, abused or well managed only by humans:

  • We maintain the garden, ecology.
  • We maintain emotional health, sociology.
  • We maintain physical health, medicine.
  • We maintain safe living conditions, civil engineering.

Or not…

God created vegetation and maintains the laws of agriculture but delegates garden maintenance, along with many other responsibilities, to humans. [Read more…] about How Does God’s Sovereignty Work?