As iron sharpens iron,
one person sharpens another. (Proverbs 27:17)
Nowhere in the New Testament do we find either a command to baptize infants or even an instance of babies being baptized. No verse hints at this practice in the first century church.1 So, Christians who hold to this ritual try to forge a link between Jewish circumcision and Christian baptism. The lone New Testament passage they can find that could possibly be read to make this connection is Colossians 2:11–12.
“the ‘consequentialist’ or ‘utilitarian’ approach (e.g. of Jeremy Bentham or John Stuart Mill), views the morality of a decision or action, based upon the anticipated result of that decision or action. It seeks to quantify the ‘highest good, for the greatest number,’ thereby reducing all ethical considerations to a ‘pleasure/pain’ calculus.” - Common Good
“Confessions is well-written and rewards re-reading, but ultimately it is good because it is true. It is a book by and for the restless soul, which is every soul.” - Word by Word
There is no shortage of passages exhorting Christians not to sin.1 So it is no surprise that John also acknowledges in his first letter that Christians can sin.2 It might be surprising, then to discover that John says that “All those who are born of God sin they do not do.”3 John adds that they do not, “because His seed abides in him.”4
Read the series.
(Luke 4:16-30 with Isaiah 61:1-2)
Jesus applied Isaiah 61:1-2a (below) to Himself. At first, this garnered praise from the synagogue crowd, but their praise quickly turned to scoffing. The Isaiah passage reads:
“n Elisabeth Elliot: A Life, Lucy S. R. Austen harmonizes Elisabeth’s public writing with the journals and letters Austen had access to, which I feel is the strength of this book.” - P&D
(Reposted from 2021. Original comments included.)
History is boring! How many times has that been said, mostly by schoolchildren who have to learn names, dates, and events for an exam? History can be boring, but it doesn’t need to be.
“Mark Ward and Tim Miller from Shepherd’s Theological Seminary explore repentance in depth as an expansion of Miller’s article, ‘Is Repentance a Change of Mind or Something Different?’” - Word by Word
“Gilson is quite a good guide to many issues. Still, she fails to warn about the serious errors associated with Revoice, and she even quietly affirms some of these errors herself.” - Ref21
“Steven D. Smith’s The Disintegrating Conscience and the Decline of Modernity traces the successive transformations of how we understand conscience by highlighting three key figures in its redefinition in the Anglo-American world: Thomas More, James Madison, and William Brennan.” - Religion & Liberty
Discussion