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MY TOWN IS TURNING INTO SODOM
ROCKINGHAM, Nova Scotia, November 1, 2019 – We live in the world, but we’re not supposed to be OF the world.
Whatever does that mean?
When I was checking out my local Reddit forum to see if I could find any “insider” scoops on the latest approaching storm, I noticed a thread about a small anti-abortion protest. The protest has been ongoing for years outside a regional hospital where the abortions take place, but it’s mostly a silent protest, made up mostly of Christians.
The video accompanying the thread showed a nun and others being verbally harassed by passers-by. The nearly 200 comments on the thread were pro-abortion.
Two thoughts came to mind as I watched as much of the clip as I could: “Forgive them, Father, for they know not what they do”, and “my town is turning into Sodom”.
Sodom was not Sodom because the men had a sexual preference for men over women; that was just one of many manifestations of the deep sin on the souls of Sodom residents. The “sin of Sodom” extended to all aspects of life and devoured nearly everyone living there. Sodomites were so deeply entrenched in sin, it became their default position and they couldn’t see or think or feel beyond it. (more…)
… AS WE FORGIVE THOSE WHO SIN AGAINST US
ROCKINGHAM, Nova Scotia, October 30, 2019 – I listen to a lot of sermons in my job. I read a lot of blogs. And almost without exception, the main message I hear coming from the pulpit today – whether spoken or written – is PROSPERITY. Many Christian teachers and preachers are working overtime to get us to see God as the eternal ATM of blessings and our professed belief in Jesus as the security PIN to access those blessings.
But it doesn’t work that way. You don’t just stumble through life, treating people like crap, and then show up in church on Sunday with your hands out, expecting God to fill them with goodies. (more…)
TOP TEN (PLUS ONE) TRAITS OF NEWLY BORN-AGAIN CHRISTIANS
ROCKINGHAM, Nova Scotia, October 27, 2019 – I don’t follow celebrity news, but sometimes celebrity news follows me when I log onto my various email accounts. Because of my Internet searches for “abornagainbeliever” (my website with WordPress), I am bombarded with “recommended for you” suggestions that include “born again”. Recently, as some of you might know, some high-profile celebrities have claimed to have become born-again Christians or to have had a “spiritual experience” that they attribute to God. Whether or not these experiences are genuine spiritual rebirths is for God to know. However, for your edification, and with a nod to celebrity cultural norms, I’ve compiled a “Top 10″ (plus 1) list of the main characteristics of a newly born-again follower of Jesus. You can compare these characteristics against the celebrity reports and draw your own conclusions. (more…)
“HOW CAN I KNOW IF I’M BORN AGAIN?”
ROCKINGHAM, Nova Scotia, September 17, 2019 – Have you ever heard someone ask: “How can I know if I’m born-again?” To me, that’s a strange question that I would turn on its head and reframe as: “How can you NOT know if you’re born-again!” When a soul undergoes spiritual rebirth (is healed, is made whole), it’s such a revolution that there is zero doubt what has taken place. It affects every part of your being, and the impression it makes on you is so primal and so deeply entrenched that you’re more certain of your rebirth than you are of your name and date of birth. (more…)
PUT GOD FIRST
ROCKINGHAM, Nova Scotia, August 22, 2019 – Do you put God first?
When someone asked Jesus what the greatest commandment is, he said:
Hear, O Israel!
The Lord our God is one Lord, and you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and all your soul and all your mind and all your strength.
Do you do that? Do you love God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength, more than you love anyone or anything else?
Do you put God first in everything?
What does it even mean to put God first? (more…)
SPEAKING WITH NEW TONGUES DOES NOT MEAN UTTERING GIBBERISH
ROCKINGHAM, Nova Scotia, August 19, 2019 – I’ve been born-again for 20 years.
Being born-again is the best thing — by far and without question — that ever happened to me. I lived as an atheist into adulthood, and then one day suddenly I was born again.
I woke up one morning an atheist and went to bed that night a believer.
It can happen that fast.
What also happened fast was the sea-change in the words that came out of my mouth and out of my pen. My voice stayed the same, but a whole different vocabulary emerged. (more…)
ORGANIZED RELIGION = DEMON WORSHIP
ROCKINGHAM, Nova Scotia, August 19, 2019 – The dividing of Christians into denominations is not God’s work; it is the work of the devil.
Those who adhere to one denomination or another rather than cleave to God in Jesus’ name are doing the devil’s work, not God’s.
If you are a born-again Christian, you are to stand on God as your rock and follow Jesus as your Lord and high priest, master, teacher, brother, and best friend.
Following the tenets of this denomination or that, adhering to creeds rather than to God’s Word is like swearing an oath, which Jesus tells us not to do. Denominational creeds come from the devil. (more…)
CHRISTIANS AND HALLOWE’EN
NIAGARA FALLS, Ontario, October 31, 2018 – When I was a kid in the 1970s, I did the trick-or-treating thing every Hallowe’en, along with all the other kids in my neighborhood. For many of us, it was the highlight of the fall season and second only to Christmas on the annual excitement scale. Other than for our masks, our costumes were mostly hand-made by us and pretty low-tech (two hangers taped together at the hooks were angel wings; an upside-down ice-cream container with a rayon scarf trailing from it was Maid Marion’s headpiece; a big cardboard box with holes cut out for the arms was a TV set, etc.), but we didn’t care how ridiculous we looked because, for most of us, Hallowe’en was all about the free chips, candy and chocolate bars. The costumes were just a means to that end.
We saw our neighborhood homes as dispensers of the free treats we so craved (and considered our birthright on that one amazing night), and for that reason all the houses we intended to hit were considered friendly turf. We didn’t anticipate having any problems when we stomped up the steps with our pillowcases bulging with loot; we didn’t expect to be challenged when we shouted “TRICK OR TREAT!”; we just expected to be given free grub, and we’d be on our way.
But there was this one house in our subdivision that gave me the creeps. Every Hallowe’en, I would go there only because the older kids I was trick-or-treating with would go there, but it bothered me. It was the only house I wanted to get away from as quickly as I could. I don’t even remember whether they gave good treats or not; I just remember that I thought the place and the people in it were creepy.
Here’s why: (more…)
BUS STOP VIRGINS
NIAGARA FALLS, Ontario, October 5, 2018 – I was on a local bus yesterday, heading into Niagara Falls.
After the driver had stopped to pick up some passengers and was pulling away from the curb, four young women (college students, I think) came running towards the bus, waving their arms and yelling for the driver to stop. The driver shook his head, stepped on the gas, and merged into traffic.
The last I saw of the women, they were standing at the stop, shaking their heads in frustration and staring at their phones.
It reminded me of Jesus’ parable of the wise and foolish virgins.
I think it goes something like this: (more…)
JOY IN SERVING GOD
NIAGARA FALLS, Ontario, October 4, 2018 – Someone asked me today why his life was going so miserably when he had invested everything he had into what he saw as doing God’s will. He attended Bible college, he prayed “three times a day”, he gave to charities, he lived soberly and chastely – and yet, he felt no joy and no connection with God, and now he even feels suicidal and wants to throw it all in.
This strikes at the heart of what it means to be “Christian”. Jesus dealt with this same issue with some of his early followers, as have other prophets over the millennia. Why give everything up for God when all you seem to get back is poverty and abuse? (more…)
A BORN-AGAIN BELIEVER 