What I Didnt Know About Sunday
Posted on September 8, 2024
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For the first half of my life, I believed if a person does not observe the Sabbath on Saturday as commanded through Moses, and instead goes to church on Sunday, then that’s a sure sign he is a “false Christian.”
That view is still taught today by many Sabbathkeeping denominations like the one in which I was raised. For example, it’s plainly taught in a January 20, 2024, sermon entitled “The Biblical Definition of a Christian” by COGWA preacher Erik Jones:
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Could Jesus Have Sinned?
(Of Course Not!)
Posted on August 26, 2024
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I first heard the question, “Could Jesus have sinned?” in the early 1990s. The leadership of the Worldwide Church of God (WCG) was making the point that Jesus was never tempted to sin, but rather was tested.
According to the popular usage of these words, they were absolutely right. Jesus did not endure temptation in the sense of resisting a strong urge to sin and only succeeding by the skin of his teeth.
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Do the Dead Know Nothing?
A look at Ecclesiastes 9:5-6
Posted on July 20, 2024
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The Bible says “the dead know nothing,” but that doesn’t mean they’re oblivious.
Yet amongst those who profess belief in Sacred Scripture, there are some who deny a conscious existence after death – and they have a favorite passage in the book of Ecclesiastes:
For the living know that they will die, but the dead know nothing, and they have no more reward, for the memory of them is forgotten.
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What I Didnt Know About the Sabbath
Posted on July 5, 2024
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Growing up in a Sabbathkeeping church, naturally I heard many sermons about why the Sabbath is to be observed by Christians.
To me, one of the arguments that boosted my confidence in the rightness of our practice was that the apostles observed the Sabbath.
Luke, who penned the book of Acts, records several occasions when the apostles frequented the synagogues on the Sabbath day – after Jesus ascended into heaven.
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Top 5 Books That Led Me to the Catholic Church
Posted on July 1, 2024
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While there is only one path to God – through Jesus Christ Our Lord – there are many paths to his Church. These paths are oftentimes paved with books.
In my case, God used certain writings to help me overcome my particular intellectual and spiritual roadblocks.
Not everyone has my background, my roadblocks. Not each book that meant something to me will mean something to you. God’s ways of reaching our hearts and minds are specially tailored to every person.
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"Neither Cold Nor Hot" -- The Real Lesson of Lukewarm Laodicea
Posted on March 25, 2024
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When it comes to our religious faith, we all know it’s better to be on fire than to be lukewarm.
We ask the Holy Spirit to “enkindle in us the fire of your love.” If we cool off – if we don’t stay “hot” – we risk quenching the Spirit (1 Thessalonians 5:19).
It would seem that if cold is the opposite of hot, then to be spiritually lukewarm is better than being spiritually cold.
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An Early Witness on "Going to Heaven"
Posted on March 2, 2024
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I remember Garner Ted Armstrong, who believed in what others call “soul sleep,” offering a “$10,000 cashier’s check” to anyone who could find in the Bible a reference to “going to heaven” when we die.
Of course, he never surrendered that money, because the Bible nowhere says the words, “We go to heaven when we die,” or anything else equally explicit.
The problem with this challenge is the assumption that every Christian teaching must be stated plainly in the Bible for anyone to simply read and understand and believe.
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What Will Your Resurrection Body Be Like?
Posted on October 16, 2023
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Due to popular misconceptions, consider this a quick Catholic review of the doctrine of resurrection:
Your eternal reward after this life is not for your soul to leave the body and go to heaven. Neither is it, if you die in mortal sin, for your soul to descend into the fiery pits of hell.
That’s not to say heaven or hell aren’t your ultimate destinations—they are—but not without your body: the same body in which you are reading this.
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Should We Accept Mary as Our Mother?
Posted on October 3, 2023
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Mary comes to the aid of her Son Jesus in a flashback scene from The Passion of the Christ. Mary is a big deal in the Catholic Church, not only because she is Jesus’ mom, but because she is our mom — your mom and mine. Not in a figurative sense, but in a real sense.
“No way,” I might have argued before my conversion. “My parents would have something to say about that.
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How the Bible Brought Me to Bacon
Posted on September 20, 2023
| 10 minutes
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Bacon is a special gift from God – one of the tasty ways by which he tells us, “I love you.”
I don’t have a Bible verse for that, but I’m convinced.
In my case, bacon has been a healthful “diet food.” With its optimal fat-to-protein ratio, it played a role in my losing 40 pounds in three months. It was part of my dietary strategy – along with intermittent fasting – to reverse my type 2 diabetes.
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