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  1. ViaCrucis

    New belief among teenagers. What do you think?

    Incredibly serious. The Smurfs were a major target of Satanic Panic profiteers, and I was banned from watching it by my parents (I usually ended up watching Saturday morning cartoons at my grandparents, and they were far less strict about it). Later on as an adult I had a conversation about my...
  2. ViaCrucis

    New belief among teenagers. What do you think?

    That's just good old fashioned scare-mongering. In the 80s when I was a kid, it was all the stories about poison in candy and razor blades in cans of Pepsi, and all the teenagers becoming involved in Satanic cults by playing D&D or watching the Smurfs. When I was in high school and the Harry...
  3. ViaCrucis

    New belief among teenagers. What do you think?

    This. I've been hearing about this "widespread trend" since at least the mid-late 2000s. And the fear/angst/anger in response to it always seems incredibly disproportionate to the reality on the ground. Are there people who engage in what I'd view as weird subcultures? Sure. I saw a couple...
  4. ViaCrucis

    Anyone have good arguments against Calvinism.

    In my own experience, that also tends to be how I view Amillennialism. Amillennialism is hardly monolithic; it is a recognition or belief that the Millennium isn't literal (given the nature of St. John's Revelation in its own context), and thus the Millennium can't be hermeneutical framework...
  5. ViaCrucis

    Can ChatGPT interpret speaking in tongues?

    My experience is somewhat opposite. The majority of my youth was spent while my family was part of the local Foursquare Church. As such Pentecostalism was a defining feature of my Christian experience. When I was twelve years old, I wasn't being Confirmed, instead a traveling evangelist came...
  6. ViaCrucis

    Anyone have good arguments against Calvinism.

    I'll freely admit that my knowledge of Post-Millennialism is lacking. Most of my experiences have tended to be with Dominionist sorts, which I know does not define Post-Millennialism; but that is the form of Post-Millennialism with which I have encountered most frequently; and as such while I...
  7. ViaCrucis

    Anyone have good arguments against Calvinism.

    In the years since, this has become a criticism of mine toward Calvinism. While I didn't grow up Calvinist/Reformed, my early years were shaped by the sort of quasi-Calvinism or the Calvinist-Arminian blend that defines much of the American Evangelical landscape. As such I grew up believing...
  8. ViaCrucis

    Anyone have good arguments against Calvinism.

    You'd be mistaken in your understanding then. Amillennialists and Partial Preterists alike would, on the whole, understand that the world does not get better until the Eschaton; but that things get progressively worse. Only the Post-millennial view provides a possible framework of cosmic...
  9. ViaCrucis

    Can ChatGPT interpret speaking in tongues?

    Across cultures, religions, and spiritual traditions there are several examples of what can be broadly called "ecstatic speech". For example in Kundalini Yoga, or in various shamanistic traditions where an individual is believed to be possessed by a powerful spirit or spiritual force. Far from...
  10. ViaCrucis

    Anyone have good arguments against Calvinism.

    I've often shared my story of having been raised in a tradition that focused on an individual, personal, sincere effort to get saved that led me to a very dark place spiritually. My struggle was whether I had "meant it" when I "asked Jesus into my heart"; and so found myself in a state of...
  11. ViaCrucis

    Child sacrifice, a transgression/ God sacrifices his only begotten

    This gets us into the nitty gritty of Atonement theology and theories of the Atonement. My personal views of the Atonement tend to mix elements of the different historic theories of the Atonement. I don't reject Penal Substitution Theory, but it's not the primary way in which I understand the...
  12. ViaCrucis

    Child sacrifice, a transgression/ God sacrifices his only begotten

    I had a great deal written before I realized maybe I can just trim it down to something far more straightforward. Jesus is not a human sacrifice made to God. Jesus is the sacrifice of God Himself, to give Himself away. Why? In brief, to reclaim the world. This word "reclaim" I'm using instead...
  13. ViaCrucis

    Cessationism isn't biblical

    Being conformed to the image of Christ is certainly an essential part of what being brought into God's kingdom means. It would appear that the reason for why I posted that passage has escaped you. I have learned already that engaging you in discussion is a fruitless and tiresome endeavor. I...
  14. ViaCrucis

    Gal 2:16 and Rom 2:13 : Works of the Law Justifies or not?

    The central thesis of Romans can be found in Romans 1:16-17, "For I am not ashamed of the Gospel for it is the power of God to save all who believe, the Jew first and also the Greek; for by it the justice of God is revealed from faith to faith, as it is written, 'The just shall live by...
  15. ViaCrucis

    Cessationism isn't biblical

    "But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law. And those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. If we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step...
  16. ViaCrucis

    Cessationism isn't biblical

    The kingdom of God doesn't have second class citizens. -CryptoLutheran
  17. ViaCrucis

    Cessationism isn't biblical

    Scripture not only affirms this, it's very loud about it. -CryptoLutheran
  18. ViaCrucis

    Cessationism isn't biblical

    "By the grace given to me I say to everyone among you not to hink of himself more highly than he ought to think, but to think with sober judgment, each according to the measure of faith that God has assigned. For as in one body we have many members, and the members do not all have the same...
  19. ViaCrucis

    Cessationism isn't biblical

    When the debate is always presented as a dichotomy between Cessationism on the one hand, and Charismaticism on the other then what gets ignored are views which don't fit into the Cessationist-Charismaticist dichotomy. Arguably, the historic Christian position has been neither Cessationist nor...
  20. ViaCrucis

    Is Muhammad the AntiChrist?

    I'm aware of theories that certain heterodox forms of Christianity present in pre-Islamic Arabia may have been an influence on Muhammad's religious beliefs. But Islam isn't Arian. Arians believed in a Divine Son of God, but they didn't believe the Divine Son of God was homoousios with the...