FEAR NOT! A Hallowe’en reminder
We know, because God tells us in his Word, that people – not places – are haunted.
Again – there are no haunted places, just haunted people (and some haunted animals).
Jesus never cast a demon out of any place. He did cast demons out of many people and once cast demons out of a person and into a herd of pigs, but there are no instances of Jesus casting out demons from a place or sending demons into a house or the wilderness or any other Earthly habitation.
If places could be haunted, don’t you think Jesus would have gone there to cast out a few demons, and don’t you think this would have been recorded in scripture? (more…)
PUTTING THE HAPPINESS CART BEFORE THE DOING-GOD’S-WILL HORSE
No other age in Western history has been as obsessed with finding happiness as our current one.
And is it just a coincidence that no other age in Western history has been as estranged from God as our current one?
Most people today (including Christians) believe that happiness is a human right, and so they spend all of their time and money pursuing things they think will make them happy.
But if that to-do list of things doesn’t include “doing God’s will”, their efforts will be in vain. They’ll just be putting the happiness cart before the doing-God’s-will horse, which will get them nowhere fast. (more…)
JUDAS IS CARROTS
When I first started reading the Bible 20 years ago, it struck me as odd that the disciples didn’t know who Jesus was referring to when he said that one of them would betray him. It seems that Judas Iscariot’s wicked ways had flown under the radar of everyone except Jesus. How was that possible? How could the disciples, who had some level of discernment, not see Satan’s very apprentice living and moving among them? (more…)
ONE DAY CLOSER TO HEAVEN
Every morning I wake up, I’m ONE DAY CLOSER TO HEAVEN.
Every step I take, I’m ONE STEP CLOSER TO HEAVEN.
Every breath I take, I’m ONE BREATH CLOSER TO HEAVEN.
With every heartbeat, I’m ONE BEAT CLOSER TO HEAVEN.
We all have a finite number of days, steps, breaths and heartbeats.
We don’t know how many we’ll get in total, but God does, just as he knows how many hairs are on our head.
We don’t need to know how many more days have been allotted us (or how many hairs are on our head); all we need to know is that every day we wake up, we’re one day closer to Heaven, as long as we stay the course that Jesus showed us. (more…)
NOW HIRING!
Full-time positions available for people to work in the Kingdom of God 24/7 until they drop dead. Ideally, applicants should be: (more…)
A TALE OF TWO CHURCHES
If you’ve been a born-again believer for any length of time, you’ll have personally experienced what I call the “split personality” or “tale of two churches” characteristic of Christianity. I’m not talking about the Catholic/Protestant divide or the countless denominations that have since arisen because of that divide; I’m talking about God’s Church and the worldly church.
These are the two Christian churches co-existing today. I could call them the “real” church and the “fake” church, but that would be a misrepresentation, as both churches are real. I know, because, even as a born-again believer and card-carrying member of God’s Church, I actively participated in worldly churches.
I don’t anymore.
Here’s why. (more…)
DIVORCE AND LIVING SINGLE (AND CELIBATE)
This is going to be a relatively short one because Jesus has said everything that needs to be said about divorce and living single, and what he says is very clear. It just bears repeating, as some Christians appear to have forgotten or ignored it. (more…)
NO, A CHRISTIAN CANNOT HAVE A DEMON
There’s an ongoing joke in academic circles that you only have to be one lesson ahead of your students to be a successful teacher. Many “teachers” live this joke as their reality, to the detriment of their students.
In Christianity, preachers are the teachers, and most of them are not even one lesson ahead. In fact, they’re so far behind many of their “students”, they should be fired.
This is the sad reality that Christianity finds itself in today and one of the main reasons why so many people who are not actually Christians call themselves Christians: The teachers have no idea what they’re talking about and are leading people astray.
When Nicodemus came to Jesus at night to learn from him, Jesus called him out for not knowing his stuff and yet still professing to be a teacher of Israel. Church pulpits are full of Nicodemuses who need to be called out for their ignorance and either shamed into learning sound doctrine or driven from the temple (with whips, if necessary).
I mention this today because there is a growing belief within Christianity that Christians can have a demon – ranging from some form of oppression all the way up to full possession. This is so much nonsense that I wouldn’t waste two seconds on it if it weren’t for the fact that people are being taught this lie as if it were God’s truth and encouraged to consider demonic manifestations in their own lives as being of no greater consequence than fruit flies in the kitchen, and just as unavoidable. (more…)
SPIRITUAL REBIRTH: Dr. God’s spiritual pain-killer
I’ve spent a lot of time around Christians over the past 20 years since my rebirth from atheism, and the one common feature I’ve noticed is how messed up most of them are. They are burdened by any number of problems, whether health problems, relationship problems, or financial problems. If they have children, their kids are (as my grandmother used to say) “holy terrors”; if they’re married, the marriage is on the rocks; if they have a house or car, they’re money pits always in need of repairs; and if they’re working, they hate their boss, their job, or both.
On the surface, though, everything is wine and roses. It’s as if Christians feel the need to project a sense that that they have it all together, even if behind the scenes they’re falling apart.
This is not the way to live your life on Earth or the way to get home to Heaven. Having no joy and no peace and stumbling from one crisis to another will lead you the opposite way of Heaven and make you very miserable along the way. I lived that kind of life as an atheist, and I see the same heaviness, joylessness, anxiety, confusion and PAIN that I felt as an unbeliever reflected in believers.
How can that be? How can people who claim to have faith in God and be followers of Jesus have lives that are so messed up and so full of pain? (more…)
SPIRITUAL REBIRTH: The only way to salvation
If spiritual rebirth is the most important AND NECESSARY change that humans can undergo while on Earth, why do we rarely – if ever – hear anything about it in the churches?
Why are people excited about births and sad about deaths and giddy about marriages and depressed about break-ups and divorces, while spiritual rebirth – conversion – is absent from their emotional radar?
Why do so few people who identify as Christian (including pastors) even know what spiritual rebirth means?
The answer is: the earthly church. The earthly church is to blame for misinterpreting spiritual rebirth and for downplaying the importance of conversion as a necessary step to becoming a Christian. The earthly church has become the blind leading the blind, just like the synagogues in Jesus’ day. How can the earthly church teach about spiritual rebirth if it has no idea what it means? (more…)
A BORN-AGAIN BELIEVER 