Grow up! Be a real man!

Excellent post by Phil Johnson on biblical manliness. Read it all, but this should whet your appetite.

If you want a taste of what real manhood looks like, do some gospel ministry in a hostile environment. Stand up for the truth in some venue where it is under attack. Get a solid, manly grasp on the Bible and stand up and teach its hard truths in a way that helps make the truth clear to people who are struggling to get it. Contend earnestly for the faith when some nice-sounding heretic wants you to sit down and have a friendly dialogue about it. Be the kind of man Paul describes here: someone who is steadfast and sure, with a solid grasp of classic biblical truths that have gone out of vogue. Stand against popular opinion when you know you should, and do it every time the opportunity arises.

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Lakeland healings: Real?

Richard Mayhue in his book The Healing Promise, p. 193 speaks to the issue of faith healings such are “occurring” in Lakeland, FL.

“James Randi has listed the criteria which his rational mind demands in order to validate a genuine healing miracle of God. They include:

1. The disease must not be normally self-terminating.

2. The recovery must be complete.

3. The recovery must take place in the absence of any medical treatment that might normally be expected to affect the disease.

4. There must be adequate medical opinion that the disease was present before the application of whatever means were used to bring about the miracle.

5. There must be adequate medical opinion that the disease is not present after the application of whatever means were used to bring about the miracle.

Randi might be surprised, but the Bible sets an even higher standard for miraculous healing.

1. The healing must be instantaneous.

2. The healing must be of a disease that neither the medical community nor the human body can heal, such as AIDS – either instantly or absolutely.

3. The healing must be total.

4. The healing must be completely convincing, even to skeptics.

5. The healing must be done in public with no elaborate services involved.

6. The healing must be of an organic disease.

These criteria marked God’s healing power through Christ and the apostles.”

By such standards, are the healings in Lakeland biblically valid? That is the question that must be answered.

(HT: Unashamed Workman)

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Probably coming here soon

Canada on the verge of banning corporeal punishment (spanking).

(HT: Challies)

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Young men in a real race!

God didn’t make young men for an artificial race. He made you for strict training for the race of life, to win the prize of the upward call of God through Christ Jesus. He didn’t make you to wast twenty-three hours, or even three hours, a week playing a mind-numbing video game. And you know it. Become a video-game junkie, waste your wonder juices on what is fake, and the transcendent thrills will no longer look real, will no longer thrill. Give your wonder to the wrong things and you will have no wonder left for the things of God and eternity, no enthusiasm for doing right in a world that has gone desperately wrong, no energy to develop your mind and body for excellence and service, no trembling excitement for the worship of Jesus Christ.

Stop in your tracks. Stop working at your play; stop worshiping your play. Make a clean break. Go into “strict training.” Start to live again. Begin by taking a baseball bat to your video games—to your computer, if you must. Cut of the right arm of video games; gouge out the right eye of those cheap thrills. Do it now. Make no mistake. It may be the difference between a pathetic existence and a life that’s full and rich, between a crown that doesn’t last and one that lasts forever.

Real men run the real race and win the real crown.

–Douglas Bond, Stand Fast in the Way of Truth!

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