I will definitely enjoy and return the set. You should keep a record of who all borrows it

http://www.thesurvivalistblog.net

Thanks for your kind words and the beautiful poem. It is my hope and prayer that you will stay the course, remain faithful and keep constantly in prayer. And I know you will

That’s a bit funny that you have a problem with the last verse of the song I shared; it’s actually my favorite verse–the part that tells my story, which is the incredible freedom and intimacy I can have with God thanks to Jesus’ saving work.

I do see your point, and I’ll respond by sharing how I view those lyrics.

No power of hell, no scheme of man can ever pluck me from His hand. That line really hit home one day when I was contemplating the potential cost to me of following Jesus. I know that like many people in the West I’ve been pretty soft and my faith has cost me very little. However that is not the normal experience of Christians throughout the centuries and around the world today. For many of them, the choice to follow Christ is a matter of life and death, as in they could be killed for their faith. I don’t know how much longer we in the West will be insulated from this reality but at some point we may not be. It gives me this amazing assurance to be convinced that no matter what happens to me or my life–even if my life were to be cut short by those who would kill the body–none of that is strong enough to break the bond I have with Christ, the bond that He secured when He came into this world and made His sacrifice on Calvary.

As for having no guilt in life, I think you and I may be thinking about the word “guilt” differently. When I have committed a sin, I do want to be convicted of it so that I can confess it, repent of it and resolve to sin no more–and this process may be repeated many times even for the same sin. If that is what you mean by “guilt” then of course we need it. I call it “conviction,” and I think of it as a positive thing, like a voice inside that says “hey, you really can do better than that.” In contrast, to me “guilt” refers to the crushing despair that can hit you when you realize you have let God or someone you love down and it often comes with the sense that there’s absolutely nothing you can do to remedy the situation and you’re just a horrible person anyway so why even try. That’s really more condemnation, and that is definitely not something God wants us to live under. I can’t speak for the authors of the hymn, but I’m reasonably sure they really mean “No condemnation in life…”–as in another verse penned by St. Paul that says “There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus,” only the word “condemnation” has way too many syllables.

The no fear in death part again comes from the understanding that truly nothing can separate us from the love of Christ, not even death. We do not have to fear that our own deaths will cause us to be separated from Christ. When I say “we” I refer to those who have chosen to follow Christ and who continue to do so. People who do not want to follow Christ probably wouldn’t sing a song like that anyway.

I do understand that there are those who believe that once you are saved you are always saved, meaning you’ll definitely go to Heaven no matter what, and there are those who use that belief as a way to justify evil in their own lives. However, that is not an automatic thing with everyone who professes a once saved always saved belief so it would be disingenuous to assume that without first getting to know them. As a general rule, the issue that most concerns Protestant Christians is that no one entertain a notion that they can somehow earn their salvation by following the rules or doing good works.

I very much resonate with the Catholic call to daily conversion, where the decision to surrender your life to Christ is viewed not as something that happens in one epic moment, but as an ongoing process that lasts your entire life. My experience is that all Christians who are serious about their walk with God practice daily conversion to at least some extent, even if their particular faith tradition doesn’t articulate it quite like that.

You seem to know more about yourself than many folks, including ME!
I am enthralled!

I have a problem with this poem:
“No guilt in life, no fear in death,…”
“No power of hell, no scheme of man,
Can ever pluck me from His hand;…”
St. Paul’s very popular words about the absolute certainty that nothing can separate us from the love of God leaves something out: free will. Altho nothing OUTSIDE of us can separate us from Him, WE can do it on our own, by rejecting Him. It is not a “done deal”, as so many “Jesus people” say these days, but an ongoing process; we can turn our back on Him at any time and become “unsaved”.

No guilt in life? We better have if we have sinned!
No fear in death? Watch out for presumption!

This is what separates Catholicism from those who choose to Protest. The truth is singular and definitive: we can’t have it both ways.

On a lighter note, I wrote a poem when I was about 12 years old. We were on a drive between our house in Aurora, IL and my grandparents’ in a nearby town…
In those days, there were no seatbelts (?!) and, out of nine children, I had somehow managed to have the most coveted seat in the station wagon: front and center!
I was leaning on my hands, which were folded on the dashboard, with my face just inches from the windshield. It was a foggy night and the headlights of the car were not providing much in the way of good viewing. (No fog lights yet either!)
The words just came into my mind. They became a self-fulfilling prophesy for my life.
I’d like to share them with you:

“Dark, the road ahead.
Uncertain.
Emptiness surrounds me.

I have but a dream.

Somewhere…

Somewhere in the darkness,
A light shines bright!

The Light of Life!

I reach out, helpless.

A tear.

He takes hold.

A smile.

No more the darkness.

No more the fear,

As this Light I meet,
The Life it bears
Becomes One with me,
To shine in my eyes forever!”

This is my ultimate destiny IF I stay the course; IF I remain faithful.
It is that IF that keeps us constantly in prayer and on the watch!

Thanks, Nanda! You are beautiful and you write wonderfully!
Kel

A Calvinist would say that it is impossible for anyone to do anything against the will of God. Even if someone unmercily raped a 7-year-old girl in the alley, it was God’s will for that to happen. God may have been telling that person not to do it, but in the end, it was His will for it to happen. This may sound like someone talking out of both sides of their mouth (and is partly one of the reasons why I’m not a Calvinist), but before completely dismissing this notion consider one thing:

To back up their argument, a Calvinist will point to the most terrible, unjust event in human history to prove their point: the inhumane, unwarranted execution of God. While it could be considered the most evil event to happen in human history, it was also clearly God’s will for Jesus to be executed. So were the soldiers following God’s leading or were they rebelling God’s leading? It seems to me that a Calvinist would have to say “both.”

A big deal for Calvinists is the sovereignty of God. To say that God doesn’t always have His way is heresy to a Calvinist. In their minds, God must always have His way, or else He isn’t all-powerful and fully sovereign. An Arminian would argue back that, on the contrary, God allowing us to choose to love Him or not makes Him a stronger, bigger person, rather than coercing his creatures to do everything He wants.

That being said, although a Calvinist’s theology says that we follow God’s will without any freedom of choice in the matter, it’s been my experience that Calvinists live as if they do indeed have choices. Also, there are certain levels of degrees of Calvinism, and I may be representing a more hyper-Calvinism here. I dunno.