NowTHINK!AboutIt

Avoiding Hackneyed...Making Sense

Heaven Closed To Sow’s Ears!

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Jesus to Nicodemus
“You Must Be Born Again”

When Jesus made that statement, Nicodemus didn’t understand what He meant. I offer the following as an illustration of what it means and why it is so.

Sow’s Ears and Silk Purses

My mother said it, your mother said it and anyone with common sense knows the following statement is true…

You cannot turn a sow’s ear into a silk purse.

This maxim is recognized universally and is usually interpreted to mean:

  • Inferior materials can’t be used to make superior products.

But it also implies that…

  • The nature of two vastly different materials can never be the same.

One thing cannot become another: water can’t become oil, salt can’t become sugar, tree trunks don’t become steel, fat doesn’t convert to protein and so on.

And in the case of a sow’s ear there are no conditions under which that principle doesn’t apply: [Read more…] about Heaven Closed To Sow’s Ears!

Sincerity Is Not Salvation

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Cornelius was a very interesting person. The Bible actually says he was so convincingly devout that his family followed in his steps. He also gave generously (much) to charitable needs, he feared God and he prayed constantly. He was trusted and had influence with many people.

The least you could say about Cornelius is he was sincere. It was in response to his sincerity that God spoke to him in a vision and on the basis of that fact alone we conclude that sincerity is important.

  • The quality of every relationship is measured by the sincerity of those involved.
  • Sincere people are honest and trustworthy. The opposite is duplicity, i.e., operating with ulterior motives and hidden agendas.
  • Sincere people never say one thing while intentionally meaning another. When they disagree with others they are honest about it without being disagreeable.
  • Sincere people are forthright. They say exactly what they mean and mean exactly what they say.
  • Sincere people look for truth, they don’t try to reshape it.
  • A sincere person can never knowingly be compromised.
  • Insincere people are complacent about error and glib toward truth. They aren’t so easily led by God.
  • God responds to sincerity.

But being sincere does not automatically make you Christian and Cornelius’ experience proves it. You can read his story in Acts 10.

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Cornelius is just one example among many of someone who was very sincere long before becoming Christian. Nicodemus, Lydia and Apollos are a few more. These are people whose sincerity wasn’t contaminated by self-serving opinions. A stubborn person who is sincerely wrong may never find the truth or accept it when found. These examples were neither self-serving nor stubborn. [Read more…] about Sincerity Is Not Salvation

Did The Rich Young Ruler Miss Heaven?

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Benefitting from graft and following Jesus are mutually exclusive.

Political Leaders
Were Like Mafia Dons

Three Gospels report an incident in which a young man approaches Jesus and asks specifically how he could inherit eternal life. Jesus’ response is a bit confusing and makes it difficult – not impossible – to achieve a clear interpretation. Because of the confusion this passage is often ignored or misrepresented.

This post is an attempt to bring sense to an otherwise perplexing situation.

The young man, who happened to be of the ruling class and therefore wealthy, approaches Jesus (Mark says he ran to Jesus and knelt) asking how he might inherit eternal life.

It’s a good question. We have to give him high marks just for asking.

The interesting thing is, Jesus did not convulsively respond with the standard “confess your sinfulness and trust in me” answer.

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Instead, in this situation, He attempted to explore the heart of this young man and in the conversation that followed, Jesus said three things that cause us to raise our eyebrows:

  • One, He asked “why do you call me good,” making the point that only God was good, seemingly insinuating that He was neither good nor God.
  • Two, He told the man eternal life could be entered by keeping the commandments.
  • Three, He directed the man to sell everything he owned and give the proceeds to the poor.

Obviously, these remarks don’t gel with our understanding of truth. They really make us wonder: [Read more…] about Did The Rich Young Ruler Miss Heaven?

28 Evangelistic Verses In The Gospel Of John

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An Overwhelming
Argument
For The Primacy
Of Evangelism

Most churches have constitutions one part of which is a statement of faith. It provides a list of important beliefs along with a brief description and several Bible references supporting the belief.

What they don’t often have but should is a statement of activities, things they do regularly as an expression of their faith. And at the top of the “do” list should be evangelism.

Although the word is not actually an English word – anglicized (transliterated) form of the Greek euangelion – it is clearly the most important issue in the New Testament.

It refers to the good news of the Gospel and any activity that spreads that message is evangelism. This was very prevalent in the ministry of Jesus.

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Without question, one of the most important lessons we learn from Jesus is how to evangelize. This intention was so obvious that the writers of the Gospels have been referred to as the four “evangelists” and of all the Gospels, John’s emphasizes evangelism the most.

Proof of this emphasis is the number of verses in John which are evangelistic stand-outs. The purpose of this post is to provide a list of these verses. [Read more…] about 28 Evangelistic Verses In The Gospel Of John

Evangelize Intentionally

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The road to hell is paved by the good intentions of those walking and those watching!

We Don’t Easily Get It

We study the Gospel of John digging out the useful bits of evangelistic information and then refer to it as the Gospel of “Belief” rather than the Gospel of “Evangelism.” We fall short of the right conclusion and then fail to follow through on any meaningful application.

And we do this because we are more content just studying the Bible than we are doing what it says. We scour John’s Gospel locating all the powerful evangelistic verses, making other pertinent observations as well and then, instead of evangelizing, we study it some more.

That is one reason I think Bible study has become an insidious and pervasive evil. It is now the cover up for inaction and ineffectiveness. All over the world, in churches everywhere, spiritual action has been constipated by the idea that once you have studied your Bible you have done your due. [Read more…] about Evangelize Intentionally