oddXian: Challenge the Consensus

Lloyd Ogilvie on "Searching for God" Paul insists, "There is none who seeks after God." I have often engaged peole in conversations who profess to have a desire to know God but who, after careful thought, have agreed that their search is more for a good argument than for a living God.

John Kerry's statement to Christian and Muslim leaders at a Loving God and Neighbor Conference “we all worship the One God, the same God” GOD of Islam: God is impersonal, not manifest in the trinity, divorced from His creation, the author of evil as well as good, not a father. GOD of Christianity: God is personal, manifest in the trinity, simulateously transcendent but involved in creation, the author of only good, a father to his people. ...While it's true that relationships centered on opposing radicals who intend to kill others are beneficial, that doesn't mean Christians and Muslims worship the SAME God, for we don't.

Jeremiah 2 13for my people have committed two evils: they have forsaken me, the fountain of living waters, and hewed out cisterns for themselves, broken cisterns that can hold no water.

Speaking to Paul's statement "none that seeketh after God", Haldane writes: "To seek God is an expression frequently used in Scripture to denote the acts of religion and piety. It supposes the need all men have to go out of themselves to seek elsewhere their support, their life, and thappiness, and the distance at which naturally we are from God, and God from us, - we by our perversity, and He by His just wrath. It teaches how great is the blindness of those who seek anything else but God, in order to be happy, since true wisdom consists in seeking God for this, for He alone is the sovereign good to man. It also teaches us that during the whole course of our life God proposes Himself as the object that men are to seek, Isa. lv. 6, for the present is the time of His calling them, and if they do not find Him, it is owing to their perversity, which causes them to flee from Him, or to seek Him in a wrong way. To seek God is, in general, to answer to all His relative ...

Al Mohler's new book: Atheism Remix Atheism Remix book site

Did life come from a primordial soup, or was it transported from somewhere else in space, or now the LATEST... Diamonds May Have Jump-Started Life on Earth . Doesn't the term "mother of all diamonds" and doesn't suggesting someone is a "diamond in the rough" now take on new significance? Comments/Questions: 1. This shows how determined natural man is to try to find ANY possibility ... in their quest to suppress or deny the truth. 2. And we get criticized for taking matters on the basis of faith? I quote "When primitive molecules landed on the surface of these hydrogenated diamonds in the atmosphere of early Earth, a few billion years ago, the resulting reaction may have been sufficient enough to generate more complex organic molecules that eventually gave rise to life, the researchers say." 3. Even if this was possible, it's another great step to show evidence it actually happened. (Not to mention explain the rise of intelligence, the o...

I have no idea who these folks are, but I am loving the intent and content. :)

Excellent article on God's decrees. The Order of Decrees Supralapsarian Infralapsarian Amyraldian Arminian Semi-Pelagian Pelagian To create mankind To elect some to eternal life and the rest to eternal separation To permit the fall of man To permit the fall of man - physical and moral deterioration Gift of free will whereby each may do all that is required of him To permit the fall of man To elect some to eternal life, leaving the rest to their just deserts The atonement of Christ - where all men are made savable, with salvation conditioned on individual faith. The atonement of Christ - where satisfaction is made for all men and all are given sufficient grace to believe, if they will The atonement of Christ - to make possible the gift of sufficient grace and give this grace to all Gift of the law and gospel to illuminate the way and persuade men to walk in it. The atonement of Christ - where satisfaction is made for the elect thus securin...

Introduction ends around 4:25. 11:00 starts the lecture. Here is the full series.

Now - I have not EVER had a significant disagreement with my brother Piper, but I DO take exception to his portrayal of the worlds greatest sport! :) At the same time, I wholeheartedly agree with this message. Blessings!

The man who is disposed to think of his sin as a great calamity, rather than as a heinous crime, is not likely either to reverence God or to respect His law. - John Kennedy, 1873

from this over-fawning article : That we are still trying to sell evolution to a large part of the public bothers him. “It is weird in many ways that natural selection is still debated,” he says. “But it is not debated by anyone who knows anything about it.” Indeed, Dawkins refuses to share a stage with creationists. “I don’t like giving them the oxygen of respectability, the feeling that if they’re up on a platform debating with a scientist, there must be real disagreement. One side of the debate is wholly ignorant. It would be as though you knew nothing of physics and were passionately arguing against Einstein’s theory of relativity.” How laughable - maybe it is because it is a non-falsifiable theory - a "just so" story that presupposes it's conclusions. A modern fairy tale built on a cosmic accident that reduces morality to brain chemistry and purposeless gene-passing. Don't be fooled, only the poseur is afraid of debating his adversaries for fear of exposure.

You decide...

Atheism and its Scientific Pretensions" by David Berlinski. "...a great many men and women have a dull, hard, angry sense of being oppressed by the sciences. They are frustrated by endless scientific boastings. They suspect that, as an institution, the scientific community holds them in contempt. They feel no little distaste for those speaking in its name, They have a right to feel this way." Thus David Berlinski, who characterizes himself as a "secular Jew", opens his critique of militant atheism. This short, easy-to-read volume seeks to establish the limits of scientific inquiry as well as counter the claims of atheist's who use science for off-the-wall philosophical purposes. ...... In Chapter One, "No Gods Before Me", Berlinski examines some of these boastful scientific claims. Proclaiming his own naturalistic worldview to be the default position, Richard Dawkins, after proudly setting forth the humility of the scientific community, suggests...

From the Mars Hill website. The covenants are major dimensions (or acts) of this drama. The goal is to see the work and person of Christ in light of the Old Testament and to highlight aspects that we have possibly overlooked. Christ’s work is intimately related to and fulfills each of the five covenants (with Adam, Noah, Abraham, Moses, and David) that God initiated in the Old Testament. ... For each of these covenants, it is helpful to highlight five special features (see Scott Hahn, A Father Who Keeps His Promises: God’s Covenant Love in Scripture): 1. The covenant mediator (the person God makes the covenant with) and his covenant role (whom the mediator represents). 2. The blessings promised in the covenant. 3. The conditions (or curses) of the covenant. 4. The “sign” by which the covenant will be celebrated and remembered. 5. The “form” that God’s family takes as a result of the covenant. ... 1. The covenant with Adam (Gen. 1:26–2:3; Hos. 6:7). The word “covenant” is...

Apparently Christ has returned, taking time off from saving souls to help direct traffic for a few years. Ex-Traffic Cop Says He's Jesus Remote Russian Sect Revolves Around Self-Proclaimed Messiah "Deep in the heart of Siberia's birch forests lies one of the largest and most remote religious communes of the planet. More than 5,000 people have left their families and their homes to move here and join the Church of the Last Testament, which has more than 10,000 followers worldwide. The church centers on one man. He is known simply as Vissarion, meaning "he who gives new life," or simply as the teacher, and he claims that he is Jesus Christ." These poor deluded people need to be directed down the straight and narrow path.

(4) part teaching on Covenant, New Covenenat and Dispensational Theology: Understanding the relation of the Old/New Covenants: Part 1 - Covenant and Dispensational Theology Part 2 - Covenant and Dispensational Theology Part (2) Part 3 - Covenant and Dispensational Theology Part (3) Part 4 - Covenant and Dispensational Theology *conclusion I found John Piper's perspective very interesting: John Piper's position John Piper has some things in common with each of these views, but does not classify himself within any of these three camps. He is probably the furthest away from dispensationalism, although he does agree with dispensationalism that there will be a millennium. Many of his theological heroes have been covenant theologians (for example, many of the Puritans), and he does see some merit in the concept of a pre-fall covenant of works, but he has not taken a position on their specific conception of the covenant of grace. In regards to his views on the Mosaic Law, he seem...

Many exhibits at “world-class” museums cost between 20 and 50 million dollars. But the entire Creation Museum right outside of Cincinnati, Ohio, cost just $27 million—and it is definitely world class. On the other hand, however, it’s not world class. The Creation Museum goes far beyond mere science. It doesn’t elevate man’s intellect by using science to “prove” ScriptureIn comparison with the Creation Museum, “world-class” museums—even museums like the Roosevelt Museum of Natural History in New York City or the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History in Washington, D.C.—seem paltry and commonplace. Most impressive is the scope of the museum. The individual displays—mounted skeletons, animatronic dinosaurs that turn their bodies in realistic motion, and mounted placards which present science and Scripture—these are amazing, but the big picture is just that: big. Bigger than anyone would have expected. The lobby itself rivals any full-size exhibit at a secular museum. A young child plays w...

article here A New Day for Apologetics People young and old are flocking to hear — and be changed by — winsome arguments for the Christian faith. .... "It wasn't too many years ago that scholars were writing off apologetics because we live in a postmodern world where young people are not supposed to be interested in things like the historical Jesus," Strobel says. "The biggest shock is that among people who communicated to me that they had found faith in Christ through apologetics, the single biggest group was 16- to 24-year-olds." Last summer, hundreds had to be turned away from a Focus on the Family- sponsored apologetics conference for teenagers that drew an overflow crowd of 1,500. Meanwhile, the hotbeds of apologetics education—Biola University and its Talbot School of Theology (CT, June 2003), Southern Evangelical Seminary, and Liberty University—are crammed with students pursuing graduate degrees in philosophy and apologetics.