QotD

No earthly good?

'It is since Christians have largely ceased to think of the other world that they have become so ineffective in this one.'

C. S. Lewis

HT:EPM Resource - Q & A About Heaven

Stark Contrast

Here's a ironic story considering the previous post subject matter...

First Coast News - Lawmaker Wants to Make Spanking at Home a Crime:

"Lawmaker Wants to Make Spanking at Home a Crime"

SAN FRANCISCO, CA -- A California lawmaker wants to make spanking children three and under punishable by up to a year in prison.

State Assemblywoman Sally Lieber says her bill isn't meant to monitor how parents raise their kids, but is simply an effort to protect the state's most vulnerable citizens.

Lieber argues since children can't be punished in schools, the same should apply to homes.

The anti-spanking bill will be introduced this week.

If the Democrat Assemblywoman really wants to protect the state's "most vulnerable citizens", then why not introduce an anti-abortion bill.

"the overturning of Roe is inevitable"

Nikolas T. Nikas on Roe v. Wade on National Review Online

Excerpt:

Even under the most conservative of estimates (and we lack certainty because we do not have a national, uniform mandatory abortion reporting requirement), somewhere between 40 and 50 million unborn children have died under this nation’s regime of abortion.

To put that number in some context, the best estimate is that the total war dead, of all causes, for all of America’s major and minor wars since 1775 is 1,329,991 or an amount equal to just one year of Roe’s infernal tally.

(HT: JT)

Our son Caleb was born three months early. He spent the first two months of his life in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit where they were doing everything they could to preserve his life. It broke our hearts to think that right down the street they were taking the lives of babies not unlike our precious boy. The day before he was born, he wasn't just a piece of tissue!

Our pastor prayed yesterday for our nation whose allowance of this evil is far greater than the Holocaust (numerically speaking). God have mercy. And we long for the day that abortion will be as unthinkable as slavery!

QotD

internetmonk.com:

"Some would say our heroes cannot be flawed, but it is the flaws of our saints that make them unique windows of the glory of God. Men like MLK faced unique challenges in their time, but their flaws are common to all of us who are sinners. As we follow their life stories, we learn where we’ve been and what we can expect around the corner. We learn God is faithful, and he will see us all the way home, no matter what our journey is like.
Along this journey, we all need companions, teachers and saints/heroes. Remember to choose and honor all three. We honor them by looking through and beyond them to our Lord Jesus Christ."

Is Forgiveness Always Right and Required?

A few months ago, I wrote a couple of entries regarding the subject of forgiveness (here and here). Then our church hosted the Peacemaker Seminar, which was excellent by the way. I have a situation in my life where this issue keeps resurfacing in various forms and with various people. Today I read Between Two Worlds: Is Forgiveness Always Right and Required?. Justin concludes that

Is it possible for a Christian to remain fully obedient to Scripture, with kindness and tenderheartedness, loving his enemy as himself, and yet at the same time not granting forgiveness to an unrepentant offender?

From what I can discern from the evidence in the Bible, and from what the Westminster Confession of Faith calls “good and necessary consequence,” I’m persuaded that the answer is yes. “Love your enemies” is something that we should do at all times and in all places. It is modeled after God’s love for his enemies, whom he loves even when they are “unjust” and “evil” (Luke 6:35). At the same time, our forgiveness of others is likewise modeled upon God’s forgiveness of sinners, whom he forgives conditioned upon their repentance. God does not forgive apart from repentance; neither should we. In major offenses, we are not to forgive the unrepentant.

Whew! This is a toughee. What's interesting is that a friend of mine brought up this same facet of forgiveness only a few weeks ago.

Needless to say, I will be chewing on this one for a while.

Rapture takes two

OTTAWA — The Rapture occurred March 31, 2005, at 9:43 a.m. Greenwich Mean Time and took both people on the planet whose theology was exactly correct.

Read the rest of the article here.

Down with OSU

As an FSU alum, I am compelled never to cheer for the Gators.

Therefore, I will root against Ohio State tonight.

Look, that's the best I can do, OK?














Also, would you like to know why we don't have a playoff?

Blame this guy.

An Ode to Free Will

Watch the video here...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IrczyFvkv8Q

This is truly the worst song I've ever heard.

I thought it was a joke, but it's from PCC.

'Nuff said.

(HT:Between Two Worlds)

CH Spurgeon on Election

A friend emailed this great quote today from Charles Spurgeon regarding the doctrine of election.

"I believe the doctrine of election, because I am quite certain that, if God had not chosen me, I should never have chosen Him; and I am sure He chose me before I was born, or else He never would have chosen me afterwards; and He must have elected me for reasons unknown to me, for I never could find any reason in myself why He should have looked upon me with special love. So I am forced to accept that great Biblical doctrine."