Posted on 07/28/2019 8:08:22 PM PDT by Rummyfan
Expect to see more and more of these defections in the coming years as Christianity wanes in popularity and influence and it becomes increasingly costly to remain a follower of Christ. There will be a high price to be paid for those who remain faithful to Christ and the teachings of the Bible. People will lose their jobs, they’ll be denied professional credentials, they will be banned from popular social media platforms and essentially exiled from polite society. Christians will no longer be able to “hide in plain sight” (a phrase recently highlighted by Rod Dreher in describing how all Christians will soon be forced to publicly declare their views on LGBTQ issues). We’ll be asked at work, at our kids’ schools, at Boy Scout meetings, and even in some churches as the culture rallies around sexual minorities, elevating their rights above all others and quashing religious liberty in the process. There will be severe consequences for those who give the wrong answer.
When all is said and done, years from now we will point to some fads that became widespread in Christianity in the 90s and early part of the 21st century (particularly in evangelicalism) that contributed to the falling away we’re seeing: Seeker-sensitive church growth models, Christian celebrity culture, and the prosperity gospel to name a few, along with the rise of social media and the militancy of the LGBTQ movement. The generation coming of age now, for the most part, has not been taught a robust theology that urges them to take up their cross and follow Jesus. Instead, they’ve been taught to elevate their feelings over doctrine (which, they’re told, divides), to satisfy their felt needs over and above obedience to Christ, and to embrace the world rather than reject it in pursuit of holiness. ...
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John 16:33
The author writes “I hope you can forgive me”, missing the irony that leaving Christianity he leaves the only method for forgiveness for any person, through Jesus Christ.
There are two lines of thought on such falling away cases: 1) the person was a Christian and now is lost forever; 2) the person was never was a Christian and was self deceived.
Fortunately, that is not my judgment; Jesus Christ will judge everyone.
Number 2.
#2, anything else is not possible. Once one has the Holy Spirit and a seared heart, it is not possible to go back.
I wonder if the person who took that picture of him near the mountain was an L or a G or a B or a T or a Q or a +. Total tool / d-nozzle.
It’s really hard for me to read this one. Backslidings can be this profound. But again (or in addition) he might have embraced a manmade caricature of Christianity which wasn’t able to stand up to the scrutiny it later faced.
Christianity isn’t primarily about sexual morality, believe it or not. It’s primarily about faith in the Son to save, and there is no sex sin that is the unforgivable sin. Sexual immorality is a symptom of a God-ignorant sense of insufficient love, and some people have to repent of lust daily, maybe even hourly.
When “conservative Christianity” can get that one down cold, and shut off the superficial judging, then it’ll be ready to visit the red light district like Jesus did.
They want to create a moral vacuum. And then Islam will step in to fill it.
Why? Because the Elites think Islam make people more pliable to authority.
Luke 21:28
“John 16:33”
One of my favorites!!!
In the world, you will have tribulations, but be of good cheer - I have overcome.
Don’t fear, dont worry.
If the Democrats take control, persecution will be heavy. Hillary already said that Christians must be forced to accept abortion.
The “Equality Bill” will effectively make following Jesus and God’s commandments a hate crime.
Or, I might say, our modern breed of sexual immorality looks like that to me. Jesus offers a very curious statement that suggests that if He were present at Sodom, Sodom would have repented. So we might ask, why He wasn’t there — surely God is not a cruel God? Perhaps it was because those evil, abusive people really had dedicated themselves so deeply to the enemy, without even a witness to the contrary left, that a visit by Him would have been pointless and never happened. (The absence of the “ten righteous men” of Abrahamic bargain could be connected to this.)
Being of good cheer isn’t always easy, when we’ve been formerly in expectation to get our political way. Letting the sin happen, and being part of God’s salvational plans in the face of the sin, is foreign to us Christians.
I always knew the lie that is the prosperity gospel would come back to bear fruit of evil. I tried to tell the people around me then. They wouldn’t listen. Now we are going to learn the hard way.
That sounds like the plot in a nutshell.
As many other gospel distortions, prosperity gospel isn’t far from the actual truth. Godliness with contentment (a prosperity of sufficiency, even though not profligate) is of great gain. And the psalmist tells us that “God’s ways drip with fatness.” We have to deal with that truth, and not fall into the opposite error of a gratuitous-starvation gospel.
Yuo can’t defect from God- once you’re a TRUE Christian, you remain a christian for eternity- IF you were never a Christian to begin with, then you really aren’t defecting from anything either because you were never truly a part of God’s kingdom to begin with! you were just faking it all along
2Th 2:3 Let no man deceive you by any means: for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first
Agreed. Sort flagellation as a way of punishing yourself for your sin is not in any way what God has required of us.
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