John MacArthur – Grace to You
After facing life-threatening situations, people often say, “I saw my entire life flash before my eyes.” That’s the picture we get in Philippians 1:11.
I am come a light into the world, that whosoever believeth on me should not abide in darkness. John 12:46)
This world is dark as midnight; Jesus has come that by faith we may have light and may no longer sit in the gloom which covers all the rest of mankind.
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John MacArtur – Grace to You
Although women have traditionally fulfilled supportive roles in serving the church and gained their greatest joy and sense of accomplishment from being wives and mothers, the feminist movement has successfully influenced many women to abandon these divinely ordained roles.
Positive beliefs are not popular these days. A mistaken desire to maintain a spirit of tolerance among all races and religions has produced a breed of Januslike Christians with built-in swivels, remarkable only for their ability to turn in any direction gracefully. The philosophy behind this whole thing is that religious beliefs are matters of personal choice, and that the Lord adapts His saving truth to the individual, varying it according to the cultural background, educational level and social situation of each one. Whatever this is, it is not Christianity.
By D.L. Moody
In the 119th Psalm and the 165th verse, we find “Great peace have they who love thy law: and nothing shall offend them.” The study of God’s Word will secure peace. You take Christians who are rooted and grounded in the Word of God, and you find they have great peace; but it is these who don’t study their Bible, and don’t know their Bible, who are easily offended when some little trouble comes, or some little persecution, and their peace is all disturbed; just a little breath of opposition, and their peace is all gone.
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By A.W. Tozer
The nearer we draw to the heart of God the less taste we will have for controversy.
Colossians chapter 4 verses 7 through 18, and this is the part of the epistle to the Colossians that nobody bothers to read. They read, basically, through verse 6 and then it’s all sort of personal data thrown in at the end and it’s easy to assume that this is the dull part of the book. That this is just the ending and a few little amenities that don’t really have anything to do with us because we haven’t got the faintest idea who that ‘first guy is and we’re not too sure it even matters. But it does matter.
In its simplest definition, discernment is nothing more than the ability to decide between truth and error, right and wrong. Discernment is the process of making careful distinctions in our thinking about truth. In other words, the ability to think with discernment is synonymous with an ability to think biblically.
John MacArthur from Grace to You
Freedom or slavery—what’s the distinguishing mark of Christianity? In a generation fixated on freedom, fulfillment, and autonomy, the vote has been cast early and often for freedom. But the Bible is abundantly clear—slavery is the heart of what it means to be a true Christian. It’s time to reassert this unpopular notion: true Christians are slaves of Christ.
CLASSIFICATION IS ONE OF THE MOST DIFFICULT of all tasks. Even in the realm of religion there are enough lights and shades to make it injudicious to draw too fine a line between men and men. If the religious world were composed of squares of solid black and solid white classification would be easy; but unfortunately it is not.
It is a grave error for us evangelicals to assume that the children of God are all in our communion and that all who are not associated with us are ipso facto enemies of the Lord. The Pharisees made that mistake and crucified Christ as a consequence.
With all this in mind, and leaning over backwards to be fair and charitable, there is yet one distinction which we dare make, which indeed we must make if we are to think the thoughts of God after Him and bring our beliefs into harmony with the Holy Scriptures. That distinction is the one which exists between two classes of human beings, the once-born and the twice-born. Continue reading
For the Love of His Truth 