Reformation

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Understanding Islam


John MacArthur – Grace to You

With all that is going on today, can you help me gain a basic understanding of Islam? How does it differ from biblical Christianity?

Islam is actually a word that means “surrender” or “submission.” Islam claims to be fully surrendered to the will of Allah. And the will of Allah,Muslims believe, was revealed through his prophet Mohammed. The revelation is written down in the Muslim holy book, the Koran.

There are six basic articles of faith in Islam and five duties. A simple Islamic doctrinal statement would look something like this:

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The Rise and Fall of the World, Part 2

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Slavery

Bible Q & A with John MacArthur – Grace to You

(Titus 2 )

Urge bond-slaves to be subject to their own masters in everything, to be well-pleasing, not argumentative, not pilfering, but showing all good faith that they may adorn the doctrine of God our Savior in every respect. (Titus 2:9–10)

The fifth category of believers about which Paul admonishes Titus is not based on age but on social standing. Douloi (bond-slaves) refers to slaves, those who were owned and controlled by their own masters.

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Scripture, Tradition, and Rome, Part 4 (Antinomianism discussed)

Scripture, Tradition, and Rome, Part 4

John MacArthur – Grace to You

Long Before Luther: Jesus and the Doctrine of Justification

No doctrine is more important to evangelical theology than the doctrine of justification by faith alone–the Reformation principle of sola fide.Martin Luther called it the article that determines whether the church is standing or falling.

History provides plenty of objective evidence to affirm Luther’s assessment.Churches and denominations that hold firmly to sola fide remain evangelical.Those willing to yield at this point inevitably capitulate to liberalism, revert to sacerdotalism, or embrace even worse forms of apostasy.Historic evangelicalism has therefore always treated justification by faith as a central biblical distinctive–if not the single most important doctrine to get right.It would not be far from the truth to define evangelicals as those who believe in justification by faith alone.

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Standing for Truth

A.W. Tozer

We have developed in recent times a peace-loving, soft-spoken, tame and harmless brand of Christian of whom the world has no fear and for whom it has little respect. We are careful, for instance, never to speak in public against any of the false cults lest we be thought intolerant. We fear to talk against the destructive sins of modern civilization for fear someone will brand us as bigoted and narrow. Little by little we have been forced off the hard earth into a religious cloud-land where we are permitted to wing our harmless

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Some Things Are Not Negotiable

A W Tozer

WILL ROGERS ONCE OPINED that a sure way to prevent war would be to abolish peace conferences.

Of course Will, as usual, had his tongue in his cheek; he meant only to poke fun at the weak habit of substituting talk for action. Still there is more than a little uncomfortable truth in his remark.

This above all others is the age of much talk. Hardly a day passes that the newspapers do not carry one or another of the headlines “Talks to Begin” or “Talks to Continue” or “Talks to Resume.” The notion back of this endless official chatter is that all differences between men result from their failure to understand each other; if each can discover exactly what the other thinks they will find to their delight that they are really in full agreement after all. Then they have only to smile, shake hands, go home and live happily ever after.

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God’s Sovereignty in the Salvation of Men

Jonathan Edwards

ROMANS 9:18.
Therefore hath he mercy on whom he will have mercy, and
whom he will he hardeneth.

THE apostle, in the beginning of this chapter, expresses his great concern and sorrow of heart for the nation of the Jews, who were rejected of God. This leads him to observe the difference which God made by election between some of the Jews and others, and between the bulk of that people and the christian Gentiles. In speaking of this he enters into a more minute discussion of the sovereignty of God in electing some to eternal life, and rejecting others, than is found in any other part of the Bible; in the course of which he quotes several passages from the Old Testament, confirming and illustrating this doctrine. In the ninth verse he refers us to what God said to Abraham, showing his election of Isaac before Ishmael – “For this is the word of promise; At this time will I come, and Sarah shall have a son:” then to what God had said to Rebecca, showing his election of Jacob before Esau; “The elder shall serve the younger:” in the thirteenth verse, to a passage from Malachi,

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Are You Asleep?

J.C. Ryle

“Awake thou that sleepest.”-Eph. 5:14

I put before you now a simple question. Look through the pages of this paper and you will soon see why I ask it. “Are you asleep about your soul?”

There are many who have the name of Christians, but not the character which should go with the name. God is not King of their hearts. They mind earthly things.

Such persons are often quick and clever about the affairs of this life. They are, many of them, good men of business, good at their daily work, good masters, good servants, good neighbors, good subjects of the Queen: all this I fully allow. But it is the eternal part of them that I speak of; it is their never dying souls. And about that, if a man may judge by the little they do for it, they are careless, thoughtless, reckless, and unconcerned. They are asleep.

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The Pretribulation Rapture

This article has been removed by Admin.

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The Once-born and the Twice-born


A W Tozer

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 →

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What Is Grammatical-Historical Interpretation & Why Is It Important?

By Dr Paul M. Elliott

You can’t know how to apply the Bible to life, unless you understand what the Bible really says.

In our postmodern society, many people — even many pastors and theologians — have adopted the mistaken idea that careful interpretation of the Bible doesn’t really matter. Some would even say it is impossible. What really matters, they say, is that you apply the Bible to your life. The problem with this line of thinking is that you can’t know how to apply the Bible to your life, unless you understand what the Bible really says.

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The free grace of God (John Gill)

John Gill (23 November 1697 – 14 October 1771) was an English Baptist pastor, biblical scholar, and theologian who wrote the following that expresses what every true Christian believes:

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Faith & Reason Conference Gauteng – 12 May 2010

By GV Swart – 22 May 2010

The conference was held at Kerk Sonder Mure in Centurion, which was kindly provided to the organisers free of charge. In itself I believe a charitable gesture and certainly not a cheap one. The venue is state of the art modern church buildings / auditorium with all the expected bells and whistles. Sound systems, lighting, stages, projection systems, CCTV in various areas, large auditorium seating +/-2000, other smaller conference rooms, kitchen areas, gardens, parking lots, guards on duty, foyer with book stalls, etc.

First impressions on arrival were formed by a large GDOP (Global Day of Prayer 2010) banner prominently positioned on the corner outside the building. organisers, participating speakers, presenters and audience members who were gathering within the building, however, presented quite a different picture. Wonderful how God works to enable His Truth to be promoted via all means. The venue certainly had no relevance to the message which issued from it; simply a set of walls enclosing a group of God’s people for a few hours.

Prof William Lane Craig, Pastor Ray Ciervo and Mike Willenborg, three Americans from what constituted the main body of the Faith and Reason team 2010, did presentations. Details of each presentation are far too extensive to mention here. Suffice to say that their impeccable preparations, evident depth of knowledge of the subject and most strikingly, their motivation by means of true faith made for an event which I will certainly not easily forget. Once again it glaringly exposes the dire need for quality impartation of the Word in our country, and the severe lack of guidance with which we currently struggle. Another fact which comes to mind is that these speakers needed no media assistance (TV, music, slideshows, side acts) to bolster their presentations.

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Everlasting Gospel from Atheist Central

Ray Comfort

But those 100 or so celebrities were just the tip of the iceberg of those who died in the past year. If statistics hold true, more than 54 million died in 2010, and 54 million will die in 2011. If my number comes up, I’m ready. Are you?

Here then is the “everlasting gospel” one more time for 2010. I hope you will listen. I would be so delighted to hear that you have given up battling against God, and surrendered to His will:

Each of us will die because we have broken God’s moral Law. Let’s see if you have broken

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