The title reminds me of that old joke question...did you stop beating your wife?

I suppose mine might be considered unique, in that I find the whole discussion extremely tiring and would rather just find out when it happens. My sole concern is to make sure that I eat the lamb with my walking stick in hand and my sandals on my feet.

Though I do fall into the post-mil camp, but just because I agree that the eschaton was inaugurated with the resurrection and every day since is about the inbreaking of the kingdom of God.

Canuckster said:

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Why does he still insist in describing it as a charge on the exporter? A tariff on Canadian products is paid by American consumers.

The only people Trump lies to are the ones who still believe him.

Fervent said:

Funny how quick the idea of states rights goes out the window for some on the right.

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True. I guess I could have waited til at least the second page

Fervent said:

Used to be that was a pretty essential plank of the party platform.

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No, it was Tea Party platform, not really a Republican platform per se.

I can't find a priest yet who's unattractive enough, lolol. This is comic relief actually. Ok there are a couple near me but they lack the warm-caring vibe and that won't work either. Ugh I need to think here. I can't exactly tell a priest "I chose you over my parish priest because I need someone less handsome," lol.

That notion of a clear sense of right and wrong is precisely what makes some sort of religious belief essential, as there is no room for morals with some objective evaluator. The issue is, which religion teaches the true morality? That depends on identifying the right moral framework, but there are critical failures to every philosophical framework. Consequentialism robs morality of anything but number crunching, deontology robs morality of flexibility and responsiveness, various subjective frames of morality end up unable to condemn even the most heinous actions...of them all, eudemonism comes the closest. But the thing that's missing from eudemonism is a clear human ideal for which we our purpose is revealed. Which is what Christianity adds, a clear purpose for humanity: to be conformed to the image of Christ.

That doesn't mean that within Christianity there aren't deeply flawed teachings that can be morally troubling, but God named His people Israel(contends with God) for a reason. And that reason wasn't to slavishly follow instructions without developing our own consciences, but to wrestle with Him on matters of conscience until we either understand His reason or recognize our own insufficiency to judge Him. There are positions within Christianity that address many of the things you express as finding intolerable, such as the teaching that people will be judged according to what they have done with what they had instruction wise. God knows that we are but blades of grass, springing up for a season only to wither away again. He demands that humans use honest measurements, and so we can expect Him to do the same.

Cristiano Ronaldo earned a trophy.

STRON

essentialsaltes said:

Let me quote it again for you.

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I dont believe thats how class action suits are supposed to work.

Several conservatives, including Justices Samuel Alito and Clarence Thomas, warned against courts using class-action litigation to essentially supplant the kind of nationwide injunction the court had just shot down.

“Lax enforcement of the requirements” for certifying a class, Alito wrote in an opinion joined by Thomas, “would create a potentially significant loophole to today’s decision.”

Federal courts, he added, “should thus be vigilant against such potential abuses of these tools.”

Whether Laplante’s decision is an “abuse” or exactly what the Supreme Court had in mind will likely wind up back before the justices in short order.

A class action begins when lead plaintiffs file a complaint in court on behalf of a larger group. This document outlines the facts, names the defendant, defines the proposed class, and details the legal claims. This filing pauses the statute of limitations, or the legal deadline for filing a claim, for all potential class members.

Following the initial filing, the plaintiffs’ attorneys file a motion for class certification. The defendant has the opportunity to oppose this motion, leading to a hearing where both sides present arguments. The judge then issues an order either granting or denying certification.

If the class is certified, a formal notice is sent to all potential class members explaining the lawsuit and their rights. The case then proceeds through discovery, where both sides exchange evidence, and moves toward either a settlement or a trial.

Akita Suggagaki said:

So you think the Kingdom came when?

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Around 70 AD. Some of the people Jesus was talking to had to be still alive:

"There are some of those standing here, who in no wise shall taste of death, until they have seen the Son of man coming in his kingdom."
Mt 16:27

"there are some of those standing here, who in no wise shall taste of death, until they have seen the kingdom of God. "
Lk 9:26-27

"Even so, when you see these things happening, you know that the kingdom of God is near. This generation shall not pass away, till all be fulfilled. "
Lk 21:31

"I Truly I tell you, you will not finish going through the towns of Israel before the Son of Man comes."
Mt 10:23

9Rock9 said:

My issue is that I do think there is some kind of significance to the return of the Jewish people to their land and I anticipate a future Messianic kingdom like in Acts 1:6, but I think dispensationalists can go too far with the separation between Israel and the Church. So, I don't want to say that Israel and the Jewish people have no significance at all to God's greater plan, and some verses do seem to teach that the Jewish people will be restored.

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A careful reading of the Prophesies about the House of Judah, the Jews, shows that they face Judgment and punishment for their continued rejection of Jesus and their reliance on their own strength. It is made clear that only a remnant will survive, to rejoin with their brethren. Jeremiah 50:4-5 They won't say much; Ezekiel 16:63
Their brethren are the faithful Christian peoples, who consist mainly of those people who have descended from the ten Northern tribes of Israel and who have accepted the Salvation offered by Jesus.

Bob Crowley said:

It obviously depends on the context.

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I've related this before but when I was still a new Christian and getting to know the pastor, he told me about an episode in his own church. This would be 40 or so years ago now.

There was a young parishioner who was riding his motorbike dangerously, stupidly. I know the pastor rode a motor bike himself in his own younger years.

So with due pastoral responsibility he warned the young bloke about his riding. He said it was obvious to everyone. I don't think I ever met this young fellow as I suspect it was about the same time I joined the church.

But the pastor said he felt a bit guilty about the way he warned him. He said he found that what he said happened and I can vouch that several of his predictions have occurred. I'm still waiting for a couple more.

What he said was "If you don't smarten up and start riding more carefully, you won't last two weeks!" He told me he buried the bike rider two weeks later to the day from warning him. He didn't last two weeks. Like he said, he found his words tended to happen.

He said he wished he'd used different terminology. He was correct in giving a pastoral warning, but unintentionally and prophetically predicted the result.

That's one case I can think of where a pastor regretted the exact wording.

That's not to say the pastor caused the chap's death. That was his own responsibility and the chances are he would have taken no notice either way.

It's a bit like the bloke sitting by the pool of Siloam for 38 years. He went around spreading word about his healing. Christ caught up with him and said ... “See, you have been made well. Sin no more, lest a worse thing come upon you. The man departed and told the Jews that it was Jesus who had made him well."

There's an inference here that the chap may have "sinned" more and a worse thing came upon him, but Scripture is silent on the issue. Yet I think it's inferred. Otherwise why would the writer put it in there?

Christ healed him with His pastoral care, but then warned him as well in His pastoral role.

You would think that sleeping in my Aunt Angela's room would bring me some kind of peace or comfort, but all it did was leave me feeling heartbroken because I knew that in the morning she would not be there to give me a hug.

d taylor said:

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What Type of Salvation Is James Talking About? – Grace Evangelical Society

What is sad is that you believe James is telling people what to do to be saved. If i am telling people how to receive God's free gift of Eternal Life, i would never use James. I would never use James is a discussion about Eternal Life salvation.

So with you bringing James into the discussion to begin with, says a lot about your view on Eternal Life salvation.

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Wrong again. I do NOT believe James is telling people what to do to be saved.

Curious, though. If James is truth, why not use it to tell the truth? Because you don't know how to do so without getting off topic? The Gospel is not just the basic black, red, white, gold pages. The more I learn about God the better I see the Gospel. When I talk to people about God, I use everything I can, and everything adds to the understanding. None of God's word will return to him void.

Hazelelponi said:

You have surety because God's promises are true.

It's just that. Are God's promises true? Yes...

If a person is drawn and believes then they're also chosen and since the choosing belongs to God you don't have the question why me and not the person to my right or left, you just are grateful you were chosen in unmerited Grace.

It's about having full faith and trust in God and not in yourself.

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That only works in a general sense, but doesn't live up to scrutiny. Perseverance of the saints doesn't hold if you don't know whether you were one of the elect until after all is said and done. So the only way to have assurance is to not question your own election, and by that I don't mean "why me?" But "Am I?" As there is nothing that separates the elect from the non-elect except God's "inscrutable" will there is no way that one can know they truly are part of the elect, or if tomorrow they're going to wake up and find that God was only allowing them to fool themselves.

That is not even to begin talking about the issue of God becoming the author of sin under Calvinism and what that says about the trustworthiness of God's promises to begin with.

When a reporter demanded to know why the summer camps along the Guadalupe River weren’t evacuated before its waters reached their deadly peak on July 4, Rob Kelly, the highest-ranking local official, had a simple answer: “No one knew this kind of flood was coming.”

Why not? Kerr County, Texas, had lots of history to go on — as Kelly went on to explain: “We have floods all the time. This is the most dangerous river valley in the United States.” The National Weather Service had even brought in extra staff that night. Most important, the service had issued three increasingly dire warnings early that morning — at 1:14 a.m., 4:03 a.m. and 6:06 a.m.

What Kelly didn’t mention, but which has since become well known, is that the Weather Service employee whose job it was to make sure those warnings got traction — Paul Yura, the long-serving meteorologist in charge of “warning coordination” — had recently taken an unplanned early retirement amid cuts pushed by the so-called Department of Government Efficiency. He was not replaced.

Pommer said:

What? I didn’t know that Al Capone was a bank robber!?

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Capone famously did hang out in St. Paul when things got hot, but I think I should have said it was Karpis and Barker who robbed the Northwestern National Bank. That bank was hit MANY times. It was a way too easy target. The MO was to hit the bank on the east bank of the Mississippi still in Minneapolis and drive east into St. Paul about a mile away through my old neighborhood to St. Paul. St. Paul was a refuge when things got too hot for the gangstas in Chicago, and they didn't allow Minneapolis police in St. Paul.

knell

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The Day Baby Sophia Taught Our Silent Parrot to Talk!​

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BNR32FAN said:

Yes all went to Sheol but not all went to Hades. Hades was specifically for the wicked whereas Abraham’s Bosom was specifically for the righteous. And Jesus went and preached to people who had died in and before the flood. It doesn’t say anything about those who died after the flood.

And you still haven’t demonstrated that God’s plan is to save those who refuse to cooperate with Him.

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God is long suffering he can wait as long as it takes for every human to come into agreement with what Jesus has done, its not our body that is " saved" but us our true self, and that is eternal.

Michie said:

We cannot know all the ways that God creates, but we can have fun learning science in the light of faith.

Painting of a late Jurassic scene in northern Germany, showing several iguanodons and an adult and a juvenile specimen of the sauropod Europasaurus holgeri. (photo: Gerhard Boeggemann, / Wikimedia Commons / CC BY-SA 2.5)

Suppose you catechize your children properly and teach them all about Adam and Eve, the Garden of Eden and original sin. Suppose you sit on the sofa one Sunday evening, read the Bible with them and explain how God created all of the plants and animals.

On Monday morning, they return to their science classes and learn about fossils and dinosaurs, which have sparked an interest and led them to browse the Internet for more information. It’s not like dinosaurs are taboo or anything. Kids love dinosaurs! Eventually, they ask the obvious question.

“So, Mom, I have been wondering: Did the dinosaurs live before or after Adam and Eve?”

You open your mouth to answer and catch yourself mid-breath, as you consider the path of reasoning. Well, that little question is mighty loaded, isn’t it? You tread carefully.

If the answer is that the dinosaurs lived before Adam and Eve, then it follows that all words and sentences in the first three chapters of Genesis are not to be taken literally. Dinosaurs are believed to have dominated the earth for more than 100 million years, first appearing more than 200 million years ago in the Triassic Period and reigning during the Jurassic Period — until about 60-70 million years ago, at the end of the Cretaceous Period, when they went extinct.

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Don't send your kids to public schools !