Cause and Effect

Another case against Baptismal Regeneration:

1 Corinthians 1:14-18
“I thank God that I baptized none of you except Crispus and Gaius, lest anyone should say that I had baptized in my own name. Yes, I also baptized the household of Stephanas. Besides, I do not know whether I baptized any other. For Christ did not send me to baptize, but to preach the gospel, not with wisdom of words, lest the cross of Christ should be made of no effect. Christ the Power and Wisdom of God. For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.”
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If Baptismal Regeneration were true, then Paul would have desired to baptize as many people as possible. He would not have restrained himself from baptizing all the believers in Corinth at that time, if baptism were the means to obtain salvation.

His point is not against baptism, but that baptism is not the Gospel and it is not the means to be born again. It is a fruit of being born again.

He also raises the issue that baptism is in Jesus name, not in any other name, or the name of a church, therefore it doesn’t matter who does the baptizing.

Faith is the cause, and goodness and holiness in love is the effect, or the fruit of our faith.

If we had the power to be good people by ourselves then goodness would not be described as FRUIT of the Spirit. Fruit of the Spirit means it comes from Him, it is His fruit.

Our faith is a gift, and it’s the means by which God produces His good fruits in us.

Personal holiness and righteousness is the FRUIT of believing Jesus Christ.

It cannot be produced by ourselves as a means to reach God. By our good works we can’t reach God.

Galatians 5:22-24
“But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. Against such there is no law. And those who are Christ’s have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.”

Today’s Tweets

God deals with each person individually, and that’s why it’s hard to make blanket statements about revivals such as Asbury. You could have the wheat and the tares, the sheep and the goats in the same building.

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If we’re not having our own personal revival, what’s preventing it?

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Here is the equation: More of Jesus, more of His word, and less of the other stuff.

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If you want to know anything about God you need to look at His only Son, Jesus Christ.

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How could we NOT always be thinking about Jesus if He is in us?

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We should try and help people understand, but we’re not responsible if they don’t.

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The open shamelessness of modern society is an expression of hatred toward God; it’s like giving Him the middle finger. That’s the spiritual meaning of it.

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Pick any person in the world at random:

How many care about this person’s soul?

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1 John 4:7
“Beloved, let us love one another, for love is of God; and everyone who loves is BORN OF GOD and knows God.”
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BORN OF GOD. That is, born again.

If you have been born again it’s because you’ve been BORN OF GOD, which means, spiritually, God is now your Father.

Your physical body comes from your parents, but, now, your spirit or inner man was fathered by God, Himself.

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Don’t underrate marriage.

Through marriage, families are created.

And godly families are the greatest thing on the planet.

Someone will say the church (body of Christ) is the greatest thing on the planet, but show me the church as it should be without godly marriages and families.

And to erode marriage means to erode the family, which is to deprive individuals of true love, and thus to erode society until it collapses

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Probably every person doesn’t thank God enough.

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The Father is your Father and He loves you very much. That’s what Fathers do.

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Jesus forgives AND makes us new people. That’s the package deal.

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For a Christian, loneliness is an opportunity to experience Jesus’ friendship.

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There’s two types of people:

Those to whom God is their joy in life.

And those who perceive God as a threat to their enjoyment of life.

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What if God arranged for a live video channel between Heaven and Earth, would more people be interested in what’s happening up there? Or a live Hell channel?

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Reading all the Bible prophecies which are yet to be fulfilled, our flesh should tremble, but our spirit should rejoice.

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Part of the new global consciousness of the New World Order is the idea that the Land of Israel is not the God given homeland of the Jewish people.

The whole world is being brainwashed into this thinking.

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If you say that the reformation of Israel has no significance to God, at least admit it has a lot of significance to satan, because he is turning the whole world against them. Of course, scripture explains that God is using satan as a puppet, and if you are against Israel you could also be one of his puppets.

So, satan has his puppets, and satan is God’s puppet, as in, an unwitting instrument of God’s judgment.

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If some came into a Christian gathering and claimed they felt God’s presence, and this affected their emotions, such as they began sobbing, or trembling, or felt loved, or felt convicted of their sins: this, in itself, does not contradict the Gospel, and is no basis for assuming it is a deceptive spirit. If we assume that all spiritual experiences must be of the devil then we are the ones deceived.

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Can God make you happy?

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Husband, if you love your wife then it’s not a big deal if she nags you, right?

Wife, if you love your husband then it’s not a big deal if he nags you, right?

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Asbury Revival (continued)

At the beginning there is no leader, no program, no chairperson. It just flows. But you can be sure this won’t last. A leader, a chairperson, a program will arise, either for better or for worse. Biblically, oversight must be there (but don’t assume oversight means control or orchestration). Elders must have the oversight, because, otherwise, there will be false teachings or prophecies made, or demonic manifestations, and there would be no one to keep this in check. The devil could do whatever he likes with impunity. However, this kind of New Testament eldership is extremely rare in practice, and what will more likely emerge is an hierarchical and controlling power structure, as is normal in traditional churches.

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The Asbury Revival is mostly repetitive, emotional songs. Now, you wouldn’t want to take this as a formula, that if your church just sings emotional songs over and over then God will touch people.

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Man’s nature is such that if he doesn’t believe God’s word he will believe superstition instead.

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A soft life makes you soft.

A tough life makes you tough.

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Until I was 24 I was not willing to follow Jesus, then, He changed my mind.

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Trying to attract the Holy Spirit?

So, He is not in you?

You can’t do stuff to “get His presence”.

If His presence is not in you then you’re not His.

Such superstitious thinking grieves and dishonors the Lord.

There are godly emotional responses to God, and there’s contrived emotion.

The key word here is “response”.

Every disciple of Jesus can be full of His Spirit at all times, wherever they are. So, we rejoice in Revivals, but we don’t go chasing after them, or hopping from church to church to find the Holy Spirit if, indeed, we are living in the fullness of the Spirit daily.

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The fear of the LORD is not so easy to define.

It’s not being afraid of God.

The devil is afraid of God (and rightly so).

It is an absolute acknowledgement that God judges perfectly righteously, without partiality.

We see it in Paul the Apostle. He said that if he went back to his old life then God would condemn him.

Now, it doesn’t mean Paul lived in fear of this.

It just means he was not deceived about God’s righteous judgment.

The person without the fear of the LORD is deceived about God’s judgment.

They go on in sin, perhaps using grace as an excuse, not knowing they are heading for judgment.

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Since there’s a judgment day coming, wouldn’t it be wise to get right with God?

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Sometimes there’s a conflict between what we’d like to do and what we should do.

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God is the source, through His Word and Spirit. No man is the source. This is the safe approach to church.

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The Holy Spirit is never weak, but our spirit can be weak, depending on how much quality time we spend alone with God.

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The movie “The Truman Show” (made prior to social media) portrays a reality TV show where the public become addicted to following the mundane life of Truman (Jim Carrey) and get their fulfillment and purpose, kind of vicariously, through him.

Prophetic.

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If you’ve been redeemed, it means someone else has paid what you owe.

A Redeemer.

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When we see this planet cohabited by 8 billion precious souls, why do we value the life of some of these souls above others?

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We don’t put the creation above its Creator.

Romans 1:25
“…who exchanged the truth of God for the lie, and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever. Amen.”

It means they served the things God made, which includes themselves, and not God.

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Love gives us a different perspective of people, things and God.

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Here’s the Sunday plan. Every member of your church gets up at 5 am and spends an hour or two alone with God. Then later they all get together and share what God taught them in that precious early morning meeting with God. And there’s your REVIVAL right there.

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Smart cities will evolve into high tech surveillance prisons.

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Only God can convince people about Himself.

Yet may we be His instruments in this.

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It’s not how long we pray but how much faith we have.

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By humbling ourselves before God we can avoid a lot of unnecessary trouble and pain.

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It’s very hard for a wealthy man to enter the Kingdom of God, Jesus said.

Why is that so?

Could give you at least 3 or 4 reasons right off the bat.

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For the disciple of Jesus, the future is absolutely glorious.

It’s gonna be tough going for a while, but glorious.

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I’m aware I wouldn’t be so well received some places if I had a different skin color.

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Where there’s sin in a Christian’s life there cannot be true joy.

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God is infinite in power, and yet there He is allowing Himself to be nailed to a Cross?

Understand this and you’ll understand who He really is.

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The Christian’s true spiritual authority in Christ is only appropriated and expressed in humility.

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Eternity is the real deal.

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Interesting to note that of all the sick people who came to Jesus for relief from their pain, not one heard Him say they had to continue in that state because God didn’t want to heal them. Out of the thousands who came to Him for healing, how many did He turn away because it wasn’t God’s will?

And another interesting aspect of Jesus prolific healing ministry, with literally thousands healed of major illnesses, is that it’s not recorded that He required full repentance from sin when He healed people.

However, He did expect those healed to repent, after experiencing God’s goodness to them.

Matrimonial Notice

We have three daughters for whom we seek godly spouses.

Aged 25 and 26. All love the Lord.

Please email me if you would like to discuss:

Ianvincent.india@gmail.com

Thanks.

Revival

A person who travels to the other side of the world to get into a room and experience God may be sincere and may have a genuine spiritual hunger, but unfortunately they’re blind and deaf to the Gospel of Jesus Christ. However, if in going there they did finally come to understand and believe the Gospel, it would be worth it.

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The topic of Revival is trending.

Would you say your own prayer life could be described as a personal Revival?

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As Christians become more superficial their concept of revival becomes more superficial.

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If some came into a Christian gathering and claimed they felt God’s presence, and this affected their emotions, such as they began sobbing, or trembling, or felt loved, or felt convicted of their sins: this, in itself, does not contradict the Gospel, and is no basis for assuming it is a deceptive spirit. If we assume that all spiritual experiences must be of the devil then we are the ones deceived.

However, beyond this, there are many experiential manifestations which are from deceiving spirits.

There’s two camps of deception:

a. The false spirit people (they have no discernment)

b. The anti-Holy Spirit people (they have taken discernment too far and falsely discerned)

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Feeling God’s presence is one thing.

Making it into a doctrine is another.

Drawing the wrong conclusions is another.

Building your faith upon a feeling is another.

Yet it doesn’t mean it’s impossible to feel God’s presence at times.

Of course, feeling God’s presence has virtually nothing to do with His actual presence.

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Is the Asbury Revival a “genuine move of the Spirit of God”?

Yes and No.

In those who are genuine, it is.

And in those who are not genuine, it’s not.

Today’s Tweets

You can’t see God, but He can see you.

Walk by faith, not by sight.

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If the national identity is a religious identity then it results in tyranny.

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If the HOLY Spirit is in you then consider yourself “on call” at all times for His service.

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Evangelism has two aspects:

1. Saving of souls.
2. As a witness to Jesus Christ, so no one has an excuse.

It’s like a two-edged sword.

Matthew 24:14
“And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in all the world as a witness to all the nations, and then the end will come.”

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We all have the time to seek God, the question is, do we really have time for Him?

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A Christian says, the nation must unite together.

But how can the kingdom of God and the kingdom of darkness be united?

We can pray that we can live in peace.

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Asbury Revival. The Spirit of God has always brought revivals. And people have always quenched the Spirit, causing the revivals to cease, or go into fanaticism. The idea of traveling somewhere to see God perform on stage is not what God has in mind when He revives His people. And the NT record witnesses to this, how the Spirit of God moved.

Everyone can have revival today, if they will repent and believe.

To travel to a revival in order to experience it sounds like an act of unbelief, not faith.

God is not at some place.

If you truly believe on the Lord Jesus Christ then God is in you.

If God is in you, it would be unbelief to go somewhere looking for God.

Notably, how did the Spirit of God move in the ministry of the Lord Jesus Christ?

Did he set up a stage and invite people to come and watch?

Sooner or later, a narcissist will try and hijack the revival by using it as his own personal platform for self aggrandisement.

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When I hear of revival in America I don’t feel it’s a sign that all will be well, but it’s great mercy and grace prior to national judgment coming. God is reviving His people and preparing them to weather the storm of judgment which is coming.

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On the subject of revival:

If we’re not praying for revival, what are we praying for? Praying for non-revival??

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It can be a fine line between seeking to be filled with the Spirit, and asking God to give you a tangible manifestation of His power (which would be like seeking a sign). Scripture exhorts to desire the fullness of the Spirit, and yet never to seek after physical signs or proofs.

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Human nature is such that man either seeks fellowship with the light, or with the darkness: with the righteous, or the unrighteous. Man is made for fellowship.

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The final delusion, the last nail in the coffin, is when a person is proud of what they should be ashamed of.

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There’s something which is surely unsettling in heaven, when someone lives without God all week and then goes to church on Sunday. It would be better they don’t go than to pretend.

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True prayer has been compared to breathing.

And the root word for Spirit means “breath”.

Without taking the analogy too far, breathing is done subconsciously. And there is that element with praying in or by the Spirit. How prayers form inside us is mysterious. It’s spiritual, and also engages the intellect.

By the Spirit means formed by the Spirit.

Whether the prayer is formed in our own language, or in an unknown language.

An example of a prayer not by the Spirit would be when we just have a good idea, pray it, and it turns out it wasn’t God’s will.

In a dead church, prayer is solely by the intellect or soul, and not by the Spirit.

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The promise.

Will He keep His promise?

Will He keep His word?

Because, if He does, what have you got to worry about?

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In the true disciple of Jesus: Christ is in them, and they are in Christ. This is spiritual union. There is no more distance between them and God.

Good News.

But bad news for those in the religion business.

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1 Timothy 6:7

“…We brought nothing into this world, and it is certain we can carry nothing out.”

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We are going to be leaving this world, but we can’t carry anything with us where we’re going. We have to leave whatever we’ve accumulated behind.

What will you have after your life here is over?

If you have Christ now, you will also have Him when you leave this world.

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Whatever we find disgusting in the world, the roots of it are in our own sinful nature. Therefore, airs of superiority look foolish before God, who knows that we are dust.

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Love is our duty, but it can’t be JUST a duty, otherwise it’s not love. Relate this to God or man.

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Last century saw two World Wars. Now, have people’s hearts really changed since then to avert another? Are the present world leaders just as capable of such immense evil as those of the last century?

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I don’t think God wants to compete with video games (or whatever) for people’s attention.

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I just hear snippets of modern music here and there, and I wonder how many options are left for contorting the human voice into something different? The present styles or singing will no longer be cool in a few years, so, either, they go back to older styles and rehash them, or come up with new contortions of the voice. Maybe the voices will get more and more bizarre as people demand a new sound ? Maybe more animal sounds? Hyena style singing? Or Gibbon sounds?

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God has known every generation, from the cradle to the grave. He’s known every one of them by name.

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God will help us understand what we need to understand, and, if there’s stuff He deems we don’t need to understand, we should be at peace about that.

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Heard today:

“If we’re to instigate revolutionary change, we must transform human consciousness.”

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In other words, if we want to control the masses and get them to go along with our agenda we need to modify their consciousness to come in line with ours.

And this massive brainwashing is indeed happening. You’ve heard of global consciousness?

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Everything you ever need to know about God is written in the Bible.

In case you’re interested.

You can learn things about God from nature.

But still, everything you need to know is in the Bible.

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If we speak the truth, you never know, some might be drawn to the truth.

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From God’s perspective, His children are seen as bright shining lights moving around on a planet cloaked in deep spiritual darkness. They are the only lights in this thick and evil spiritual atmosphere.

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2 Corinthians 13:14

“The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Spirit be with you all. Amen.”
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Fellowship is in the communion of the Holy Spirit.

If people in a group all share the same Spirit then they have fellowship.

They will all share a common witness of the Spirit.

And they will all have a witness in them to the word of God.

When we teach God’s word in such a setting, all receive God’s word.

True ministry is spirit to spirit, or heart to heart.

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As God doesn’t forget those faithful to Him, neither should we forget those faithful to us.

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Another case against evolution. How did birds know they need hollow bones in order to be light enough to fly?

Did birds with solid bones keep crashing, so they had the idea they better lighten their bones?

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God has never failed to give grace. There is also responsibility.

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Living without the Holy Spirit would be like a fish trying to live on the dry land.

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More people have experienced religion than have experienced the Holy Spirit.

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God gives us life to do His will, not our own.

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The “Church of England” says, “God is neither male or female”.

Consider, that Jesus is the Son of God, not the daughter of God, and He is God the Son, and that He called God His Father, not mother.

On this basis it’s patently false to want to call God an “it” or “mother” rather than, Father.

Just having a lot of money and buildings doesn’t make it a legitimate church.

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The kind of Christian more likely to be accepted by the general public is the one who never speaks up about what Jesus said.

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He is far more conscious of us than we are of Him.

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A baby in the womb is just as much a person as a baby out of the womb. It doesn’t become a human being after delivery. It’s already a human being. What are you robbing that person if you murder them?

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If Christ is our life, even if our world falls apart, we still have a life.

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Holiness is the only true, lasting beauty, and every follower of Jesus can have it.

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Galatians 2:21
“I do not set aside the grace of God; for if righteousness comes through the law, then Christ died in vain.”

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In other words, if we could redeem ourselves, then Christ died for nothing.

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Regarding the satanic Grammy show: Yes, there is a fallen angelic being named satan (among other titles). We know this because Jesus Christ described him in detail. Now, he has deceived the whole world, scripture says. So, this means his stooges are the most deceived by him. All those medieval images of satan, the dude in red pajamas with a pitchfork, is all a caricature which he created so that people would mock the idea that satan is real. He wants people to think of him as a myth because he has the most power over those he has convinced that he doesn’t exist. So, the Grammy show is just another joke which satan has got his puppets to perform. Satan knows he will soon be thrown into the Lake of Fire, and he wants to take as many with him as he can.

The trick, therefore, is that people associate the devil with the medieval image. They don’t expect him to come adorned with gold and expensive religious gowns, and with a cherubic, kind and loving face. The Bible says he comes as an angel of light.

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The suffering caused by the earthquake leaves us helpless to lend a hand. However, such devastation will come to our own doorstep before too long, then we can lend a hand.

Today’s Tweets

Proceed with prayer.

And go ahead with great confidence in God.

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The things going on in Heaven right now are far better and more interesting than the things going on here.

The people in Heaven have no faults or weaknesses, nor bias or ignorance, and they’re all full of love. Not surprising they get on well up there.

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Matthew 25:6-7
“And at midnight a cry was heard: ‘Behold, the bridegroom is coming; go out to meet him!’
Then all those virgins arose and trimmed their lamps.”
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The whole body of Christ hear a cry that Jesus is coming soon. Seems to indicate the cry comes from the Spirit of God.

This happens at “midnight”, which means right at the end of the age.

Is the true body of Christ hearing this cry in the Spirit right now?

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Imputed (positional) righteousness and practical (temporal) righteousness are one package. You can’t have one without the other. And it’s like a marriage, the two become one. You live righteously because God recreated you into a righteous person, and imputes the righteousness of His Son to you.

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Spiritual strength is strength of character.

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Often people mistakenly think of truth as something within the confines of religion.

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In a mature house church the topic of “house church” is no longer the main topic discussed.

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The Kingdom happening right now is that which is conformed to the Eternal Kingdom of Christ. Such people already live by the same values they will live forever with in His Kingdom.

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Life and living; the idea, from concept and design, all the way to the finished creation, was God’s project.

It didn’t create itself.

This means all the myriad nuances of what it means to live, enjoy and experience life were God’s idea.

It wasn’t accidental.

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Who defines what is immoral?

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Remember when the vaccine was pushed as “totally safe”, even though the long term effects were unknown?

Remember when you were forced to be vaccinated to supposedly safeguard the lives of others?

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Probably, the people who love their country are the ones who pray for it, that there will be a turning from lawlessness to righteousness. Pray for righteous leaders.

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Exodus 20:12
“Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be long upon the land which the Lord your God is giving you.”

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It’s to honor them unconditionally, whether you think they are good or bad parents.

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First, God made the planet, and made it capable of supporting life, then He made the life to inhabit it.

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We live for Him, and we live by Him.

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Do you believe everything made itself out of nothing for no purpose?

If so, that is your belief, or your faith or religion.

But it’s an absurd religion to cling to.

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In a complex organism there are a multitude of individual components, of which, the absence or malfunction of even just one of them might make it impossible for it to live. Now, if each component made itself, for no reason, and purely by accident, that’s a lot of accidents that needed to happen in perfect sequence and harmony to make the organism live. Talk about a miracle of luck.

Each component of an organism had to be individually designed and created (just as in any complex device) to fit into the overall plan, so an organism is not just one creation, but an ordered assembling of thousands of individually created components. Not to mention all the components which make up just one component.

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Servants are either faithful or unfaithful to their Master.

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If we’re too busy to spend time alone with God then we’re fools.

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Some critics say Jesus never claimed to be God and never demanded people to worship Him, and therefore couid not be God.

This thought presupposes or assumes that if Jesus were God, the proof of this would be in Him going around claiming to be God and ordering people to worship Him.

That is a foolish assumption because it betrays an ignorance of the humility of God. If the Messiah has to glorify himself, then he has no glory. Just as anyone who glorifies themselves. Jesus didn’t glorify Himself, His Father did.

There are several things to consider:

a. Jesus did make some claims: He claimed preexistence. He claimed He was with the Father and sent to earth by Him. He claimed that He and the Father were One, and if you had seen Him you had seen the Father. He claimed authority to forgive sins. He claimed to be the Messiah, prophesied in scripture. He claimed He is the King of God’s Kingdom and that He will judge and rule the whole human race.

b. When people acknowledged Him as God, either verbally, or by bowing down and worshipping Him, He accepted it. If He were not God He would have been a sinner for allowing people to worship Him.

c. When John the Baptist sent messengers to Jesus asking if He is the One, Jesus replied, not by making a claim about Himself, but asking John to make up his own mind by considering the things He had done. Only God could have done such miracles.

Of course, this is only concerning the subject of claiming to be God.

There are other facts which attribute to His divinity.

Chiefly, His resurrection from the dead.

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When we are born we are born into this world and belong to it, but if we are born again we belong to another world and to a Kingdom which is not of this world.

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If a church is filled with the Holy Spirit it doesn’t need a leader/s, but it will need Elders as facilitators.

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Hatred for the Jews, and denying them their ancestral homeland, is not normal hatred, it is a spiritual enmity which began when God made a Covenant with Abraham.

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Selective Outrage is outrage selected as per one’s particular political, social or spiritual ideology.

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A miracle of grace.

Grace is the greatest miracle, and is available to all.

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Someone said, they have no idea what it means to be “born again”.

They have no way to understand what it means because it hasn’t happened to them.

It means God gives us a new life.

How does He do it?

First we need to acknowledge to God we are dead in our sins, guilty, and rightly condemned for breaking God’s laws, and confess our need for a new life. We need Him to wash away all our sins and guilt and make us new people who have power over sin. Set free from bondage.

If we want a new life, we must let go of the old life, and renounce our sins.

By grace you are saved through faith in Jesus Christ.

Get alone with God. Truly repent and put your trust only on Jesus. We will need to no longer trust ourselves or in any religion. We need to trust the Person of Jesus Christ.

If you are saved by grace, then you’re saved and born again.

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There are coincidences and there’s also providential “coincidences”. God’s providence is a great wonder. He’s so great, and yet His eye is on the sparrow, and as there’s a lot of sparrows to feed it shows how great He is. He cares for all people, scripture teaches.

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The truly positive message is the one which helps conform us to Christ, reveals Him, and helps us to know Him better.

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The world says, get for yourself.

Jesus says, deny yourself.

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The Holy Spirit is the Spirit of God, and the Spirit of Christ, so if He is in us then we have all the resources of God within us. However, for those resources to be accessed depends on a whole bunch of things. They will be accessed according to God’s order, plan and purpose, and through growing in knowledge of Him. They will be accessed through faith, through the Word of Truth, through connection to our living Head, Jesus Christ, and by our fellowship with the members of His body. In other words, having ALL the resources of God within us doesn’t make us independent of others, nor does it mean we have a short cut to living and growing like Him, as it doesn’t cancel our need for diligence, commitment to understanding God’s words in scripture, faithfulness, servanthood and loving obedience.

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Jesus said, “I am the Door!”

An open door.

Open to you right now.

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The Cross was horrific.

It had to be.

Because man’s sin is horrific.

God Himself paid our debt in full.

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Some churches expect too much, while others expect too little.

Some lay heavy burdens of commitment, overloading people’s lives with programs, while others don’t even know the concept of commitment.

How we relate to other Christians, and what form it takes, needs to be voluntary and without pressure to conform.

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God owns everything, including the time. It’s all His.

Therefore, we have a problem, don’t we, if we’re not comfortable with this fact.

Creator = Owner

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Scripture is like fresh pure water in the desert.

Surely people can tell when they read scripture that is at a whole higher level than reading anything else?

If the Word of God doesn’t mean anything to you, then, if God’s words don’t mean anything to you, how can it be that God means anything to you?

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There’s us knowing Jesus Christ, and there’s Him knowing us.

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That He personally knows me is too wonderful to fully comprehend.

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Give honor to whom it’s due.

How much honor is due to the Lord Jesus Christ?

If people called you an idiot, you would feel dishonored.

People use Jesus name as a mockery.

It dishonors Him.

It’s like making Him out to be an idiot.

Now, to dishonor Him is a very serious business.

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If God helps you achieve something, how much credit could you personally take for it?

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For me, one of the saddest things in the world is to watch someone zealously pursue a religion, philosophy or spirituality, and yet miss out on God’s free gift of salvation, which is by faith in Jesus Christ, alone. Imagine devoting your entire life to a lie, and then dying, losing your soul, because your own efforts could not atone for your sins. And considering the sheer numbers of such, it’s a tragedy of epic proportions.

There’s those who are trying to earn salvation, and those who think they’ve earned salvation, and there’s those who don’t believe they need salvation, and there’s those who are not sure what they believe.

And there’s those who know Jesus Christ has saved them.

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In the world, evil is thought of as that which a person does that harms others.

Whereas, Jesus taught it’s much more than this: because a person might not harm anyone, and even do good to others, yet still be evil in themselves, in relation to God.

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Matthew 7:22-23

“Many will say to Me in that day, ‘Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name, cast out demons in Your name, and done many wonders in Your name?’

And then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness!’

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These trust in their own righteousness, as seen in their appeal to the good things they have done.

Jesus calls them lawless.

No doubt, at the very least, they actually are lawless in their inner man and thoughts, if not outwardly lawless, while all the while publicly touted as notable Christians.

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We’re either blessed here, today, or we go to glory and have a blessed day there. Either way we have a blessed day.

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Colossians 3:4
“When Christ who is our life appears, then you also will appear with Him in glory.”

James 4:14
“…whereas you do not know what will happen tomorrow. For what is your life? It is even a vapor that appears for a little time and then vanishes away.”

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What is your life?

If Christ is our life, the things which are life to us must have some connection to Him.

Things done in Him, in His life, by His life, have life. Other things don’t have life, they are dead things.

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The world is not an illusion, but what it promises is an illusion.

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Nationalism based on a religion isn’t actually nationalism anyway.

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It’s not a question of who is right and who is wrong, it’s that Jesus is right. Our confidence is only in the fact He is right, and not on whether anyone else, including ourselves, are right He is right, and He is completely and perfectly right about everything, and He is alive. If He were dead it wouldn’t matter if He were right, but He’s alive.
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Acts 17:30-31 “Truly, these times of ignorance God overlooked, but now commands all men everywhere to repent, because He has appointed a day on which He will judge the world in righteousness by the Man whom He has ordained. He has given assurance of this to all by raising Him from the dead.”

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Whether people are in Heaven or Hell, now they know the truth.