Posted on 09/19/2017 6:22:17 PM PDT by hiho hiho
We are saved by grace through faith. We are not saved by “repentance”. New Testament “repentance” is repentance from dead works - that means turning for your own righteousness and receiving the righteousness of Christ as a gift by faith.
The law is perfect but can’t save you. The law condemns you. The law is meant to show you your need for Christ (Galatians 3:24). Only Jesus Christ saves you by grace through faith. There’s no other way.
“Whoever calls on the name of the LORD shall be saved.” Romans 10:13.
For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord: I will put My laws in their mind and write them on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people.None of them shall teach his neighbor, and none his brother, saying, ‘Know the Lord,’ for all shall know Me, from the least of them to the greatest of them.
For I will be merciful to their unrighteousness, and their sins and their lawless deeds I will remember no more.”
In that He says, “A new covenant,” He has made the first obsolete. Now what is becoming obsolete and growing old is ready to vanish away.
Choirs rock God’s house every week. Small praise teams seem to have difficulty doing it every week.
For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord: I will put My laws in their mind and write them on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people.None of them shall teach his neighbor, and none his brother, saying, ‘Know the Lord,’ for all shall know Me, from the least of them to the greatest of them.
For I will be merciful to their unrighteousness, and their sins and their lawless deeds I will remember no more.”
In that He says, “A new covenant,” He has made the first obsolete. Now what is becoming obsolete and growing old is ready to vanish away.
Heb 8:10-13
Let me get this staright. The author thinks sermons should be based on a liturgical calendar? Wow.
I didn’t used to think this way, but the “liturgical calendar” puts needed restrictions on the clergy. It keeps the sermons more about the “appointed” lessons (longer readings than a verse or two) and less about the preacher.
God is not the same thing as religion, which is man’s creation. Grace lies in The Word.
Not a choir, but a quiet reverent duo rendition of “The Cradle Hymn” by Isaac Watts:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KUatOdMpAWA
The inner city choirs can be worse than the hootenany of the seeker churches.
I gave up my church a long time ago. They were bring in every stray alien from every country. They want to house them, feed them, and get them into government programs as fast as possible.
They ignore abortion altogether.
They support gay marriage, sodomy,and every single sin prohibited in the Bible.
Hate the sin, love the sinner is God’s law but allowing it willingly and supporting it is no longer my religion.
I gave up my church a long time ago. They were bringing in every stray alien from every country. They want to house them, feed them, and get them into government programs as fast as possible.
They ignore abortion altogether.
They support gay marriage, sodomy,and every single sin prohibited in the Bible.
Hate the sin, love the sinner is God’s law but allowing it willingly and supporting it is no longer my religion.
“Sermons are guided by what the pastor says God is telling him (and it’s usually a him, unfortunately)...”
_________________________________________
Seeming to call for orthodoxy... fails orthodoxy.
By the Grace and Gift of God, I was able to fill the pulpit of a church which had went totally into that type of rock and roll worship. The numbers had dropped badly, the people were not being fed the Word of God, and the Spirit was totally absent.
Within a month I had gotten rid of the bebop Christian music, pulled out the hymnals, and had the congregation singing together. We started real Bible studies and preaching from the Word of God, not what some desk bound person had decided would be the topic of the week.
From 30 on a Sunday to over a hundred each Sunday. Full Sunday School classes, fifty people in our Wednesday Bible study, and this Sunday we ended the service singing Our God is an Awesome God acapellla.
People were stopped on the street outside listening to what we were doing.
I praise God daily for His gift of sending me to Sierra Leone and thank Him for the opportunity to serve. Church is NEVER boring or without it’s exciting moments.
I note the sarcasm and agree with your points. The rest of the congregation can bob their heads or lift their hands. If they want to sing communally unto the Lord, well, unfortunately they’ll be drowned out by the drums and the amplified voices/guitars/keyboards.
“If they don’t take tithes, how do they pay the minister?”
Maybe they don’t have a portion of the service where they pass he offering plate, but receive offering without the production. My uncle’s church had offering boxes that only members and regular attendees were aware of and that’s where they deposited their tithes and offerings.
As my dad announced when he noticed visitors in a service and it was time for the offering, it’s the “job” of members and regular attendees to support the church financially. If you are visiting, we do not want or expect you to give. (Some did, anyhow.)
You have no idea what their personal situation is. For all we know, she could be barren. He could be infertile. She may have medical issues that would prevent a pregnancy.
Stop being so judgmental without know any fact at all.
“I like traditional, but can tolerate modern worship. (Our church does both).”
When we move and look for a church i have a checklist when I call the preachers to “interview” them. If a church “does both” - traditional and modern - it’s crossed off. If a minister condones or tolerates the contemporary, he isn’t a pastor we want.
That’s rude. Maybe they’ve only been married for a few months. Maybe they’d be more in God’s will if they’d have had an illegitimate child earlier so when this article was written a child could be mentioned in the bio to make you happy.
You are correct. It was rude. Maybe he should have mentioned that he had children, since his interview from 2014 states;
“I am a husband and father, love baseball, music, and theology, and serve a United Methodist church in the Houston area.”
But maybe he considers the dog a child, like some Millennials do.
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