Arguments for the existence of an absolute moral law.

In our age of multicultural relativism, the ten commandments are often viewed as dead platitudes, antiquated and irrelevant for modern man. Several years ago, there was a long and furious debate when a judge in America placed the ten commandments in his courtroom. Despite the fact that they were eventually removed, the judge received a lot of support for his action. In the last century, God was declared dead and yet it appears that it is only His detractors who have died and He is still alive. Various countries have tried, and yet have been unable to banish God. A zampolit (protector of Soviet dogma) pressuring a Christian pastor, was asked by that pastor, “If the party told him tomorrow to go to church and light a candle, what would he do?” He responded, that it would never happen. Well, that “never” has happened and that tomorrow has come. Many years later that same zampolit printed Gospel tracks for me, an American missionary. Read the rest of this entry »

In trembling hands, the fruit rolled off his fingers and dropped to the ground. The fruit had an overpowering taste that was different than anything he had eaten before. And yet, no sooner had he tasted the sweet juices of the fruit than he was filled with a bitterness that reached deep into his soul. No one needed tell him what had just happened. It was all too painfully clear as a new sensation arose within him. What was it? Though he had never even thought of such a word, “guilt” seemed to be appropriate description of what he was feeling. It seemed to become apart of his innate knowledge of himself. The fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, did indeed impart a deep knowledge. The knowledge itself was of no abstract theoretical type. Read the rest of this entry »

Stories of a creature with a head like a dog and hind legs like a kangaroo, which sucks the blood out of chickens and rabbits take us back to the old country. Yes, it may be part of what we call the Old Country, however it is in modern day Ukraine that these stories live. Not long ago, I was made aware of these creatures roaming the western Ukrainian countryside. By all accounts, this creature or creatures have even made it to the outskirts of Kiev. It would normally be worth little more than a short account in your supermarket tabloids if it weren’t for the level of publicity and actual concern of people. Several news stories have been dedicated to sightings of chupakabra, the above described creature. Read the rest of this entry »

I am pained to write about church conflicts. Yes, it is a reality and that does not bother me as much as what impression it leaves upon others. When there are conflicts within the Christian community, those unaffiliated smirk. It seemingly gives the onlookers ample justification for their rejection of the Gospel. “If the good news of Jesus is full of peace and love, then why all this bickering?” There are some merits to this line of argument, but I believe it is intentionally short-sighted and a superficial evaluation of the situation. Here are some important aspects that the outsider does not consider.

1. A functioning church is not a place of superficial contacts. Read the rest of this entry »

“I marvel that you are turning away so soon from Him who called you in the grace of Christ, to a different gospel, which is not another; but there are some who trouble you and want to pervert the gospel of Christ.” Galatians 1:6-7

The question arises, “What defines a different gospel?” Or rather, “How far can we move away from the gospel before it is no longer the gospel?” The answer lies in the gospel itself. For to understand a perverted gospel we must understand the true gospel. Upon some meditation, I have compiled a list of five essential points. These are fundamental aspects of the gospel, with which if there any variance the gospel ceases to be the gospel.

Read the rest of this entry »

I have formated the   Russian Synodal Bible for Kindle with Cyrillic letters.   Parrallel I have formated the Greek NT WH with accent marks.   Both are laid out similar to my KJV format for Kindle.  They are saved in .mobi format so they may work on some other devices as well.   Let me know if you find these useful.

NOTICE:  These will not show on just any Kindle.  To use these files you need a jail broken kindle with the Unicode font hack, which can be found here  http://blogkindle.com/unicode-fonts-hack/ .   I have successfully used this hack, but use it at your own risk.

Contextualization is a popular word in missiology (though neither word is very popular with my spell checker).  This is rightly so.  Contextualization in the context of missiology is the process of taking the gospel message from the context of the Hebrew and first century New Testament world and relaying it in terms that is understandable to present day cultures, especially as it relates to cultures foreign to our own.

Now how does this relate to the terms Allah ( الله‎ ) and Elohim (אֱלהִים)? Read the rest of this entry »

For myself and everyone else who might have got an Amazon Kindle for Christmas, here is the KJV formated for the Kindle. There is a table of contents to jump to each book and a table for the chapters at the beginning of each book. I hope you find this useful.  Here is the link to download the Bible.  Bible KJV.prc Just place it in your Documents folder on your Kindle.

Adam awakened to life with a powerful innate sense of his Creator near. He takes a deep breath of gratitude for the life he now possesses. He looks around and begins to explore his new world. He caches a glimpse of a brightly plumed bird and calls out “parrot”, as if it could not be named anything else. He walks over to a pool of water and bends down. Seeing his reflection he studies himself, smiling as he does, pleased at what he sees. He playfully dips his hand into the pool to catch a “fish”, as he so declares it to be. No sooner has he done so, than he forgets his intentions and with elation Read the rest of this entry »

In a couple of weeks I will begin to teach an Introduction to Systematic Theology. I added the word “introduction”, because I dare not think that in a two week span I can purport to teach anything comprehensive about theology. But one could go further. How dare we purport to know anything about God? Isn’t it the ultimate pride to study God? As if He is susceptible to man’s peering eyes of curiosity? But isn’t that very thing, “the study of God”, the very definition of theology? Isn’t this in and of itself the very audacity of theology? Read the rest of this entry »