There is a smug calm latitudinarian Christianeese infiltrating the Christian church in these diverse times. It is these, so called, Christians who cannot affirm what God says about Himself because, however explicit God was, we are too intrusive and arrogant to assert God is entitled to act according to His Word. With a cool smile and an almost kindred kindness, savy benedictions are extented void of any real content. If the content of our concern doesn't rise to the heights of our concern then our concern may be illigitamate. Just the same as any concern that the moon will fall to the earth tomorrow may not be a legitamate concern in lieu of the natural order of things. However chill and calming our demeanor, if our affirmations accommodate our own clever bent and our own pequilar concern void of biblical affirmations, we will inevitable fall into error. God has spoken. If God has spoken we are obligated to observe what He has said. The implications and entailments are far-reaching, incomprehensible, and mysterious; however, God has communicated what he has chosen to communicate that His will might be accomplished. We are not asked, "Do you think what God has said is cool?" If there is a God and if He has spoken we are obligated to listen and obey. This generation thinks it is so clever. The age old cry has gone foward again, "Hang up the old hat of biblical authority and call everyone your brother." I don't think that is a loving thing to do, especially because we have cared more about a so called "ecuminicity" than the truth. May God help us!

Sensual faith lures us back time and time again like cigarettes and candy. We are looking for the same fix, the same psydo-consummate sensation: we repeat the same function for the ecstasy of this fix. This mysterious experience practiced in unbounded variations we have usefully called worship.

Mystics esteem their opinions and their experience above the nature and extent of the greater authority whereby men are saved, sanctified and secured, namely the Word of God. Their obnoxious opinions defy the very ground of biblical faith because their perceptions about God are contingent upon their experience of Him, presupposing God acts in a way He has not acted and says what He has not said. Sure, a consciences mystic may try to provide a kind of biblical argument; however, his proof texts patronize the biblical attestation more than agree with it. If only they heard what they were saying, "God subjectively graces them with a special special revelation beyond and above what he has affirmed with the words of His mouth."
On the contrary, Christians affirm that God shines into our hearts the knowledge of the glorious gospel of Jesus Christ acting specially or supernaturally with the same kind of creative power he employed when He spoke the world into existence. Christians also affirm that God works through means namely the sacraments, the Scriptures, and prayer: otherwise there is not an ounce of surety that God acts in a given esoteric way as many mystics protest.

किंग David's Prayer

16 Then King David went in and sat before the Lord and said, “Who am I, O Lord God, and what is my house, that you have brought me thus far? 17 And this was a small thing in your eyes, O God. You have also spoken of your servant's house for a great while to come, and have shown me future generations, [1] O Lord God! 18 And what more can David say to you for honoring your servant? For you know your servant. 19 For your servant's sake, O Lord, and according to your own heart, you have done all this greatness, in making known all these great things. 20 There is none like you, O Lord, and there is no God besides you, according to all that we have heard with our ears. 21 And who is like your people Israel, the one [2] nation on earth whom God went to redeem to be his people, making for yourself a name for great and awesome things, in driving out nations before your people whom you redeemed from Egypt? 22 And you made your people Israel to be your people forever, and you, O Lord, became their God. 23 And now, O Lord, let the word that you have spoken concerning your servant and concerning his house be established forever, and do as you have spoken, 24 and your name will be established and magnified forever, saying, ‘The Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, is Israel's God,’ and the house of your servant David will be established before you. 25 For you, my God, have revealed to your servant that you will build a house for him. Therefore your servant has found courage to pray before you. 26 And now, O Lord, you are God, and you have promised this good thing to your servant. 27 Now you have been pleased to bless the house of your servant, that it may continue forever before you, for it is you, O Lord, who have blessed, and it is blessed forever.”

Hezekiah's prayer

15 And Hezekiah prayed before the Lord and said: “O Lord, the God of Israel, enthroned above the cherubim, you are the God, you alone, of all the kingdoms of the earth; you have made heaven and earth. 16 Incline your ear, O Lord, and hear; open your eyes, O Lord, and see; and hear the words of Sennacherib, which he has sent to mock the living God. 17 Truly, O Lord, the kings of Assyria have laid waste the nations and their lands 18 and have cast their gods into the fire, for they were not gods, but the work of men's hands, wood and stone. Therefore they were destroyed. 19 So now, O Lord our God, save us, please, from his hand, that all the kingdoms of the earth may know that you, O Lord, are God alone.”

Justin Martyr Quotations: given by Dan Saxton

justin: Ch.11: “For the true spiritual Israel, and descendants of Judah, Jacob, Isaac, and Abraham (who in uncircumcision was approved of and blessed by God on account of his faith, and called the father of many nations), are we who have been led to God through this crucified Christ, as shall be demonstrated while we proceed.”

Ch. 44: “And you deceive yourselves while you fancy that, because you are the seed of Abraham after the flesh, therefore you shall fully inherit the good things announced to be bestowed by God through Christ. For no one, not even of them, has anything to look for, but only those who in mind are assimilated to the faith of Abraham…..”

Justin on the Law: Ch. 46: “You perceive that God by Moses laid all such ordinances upon you on account of the hardness of your people’s hearts, in order that, by the large number of them, you might keep God continually, and in every action, before your eyes, and never begin to act unjustly or impiously.”

Is anything too Hard for HaShem (The Lord) ?

הֲיִפָּלֵ֥א מֵֽיהוָֹ֖ה

Quotes from: Modern Spiritual Gifts as Analogous to Apostolic Gifts: Affirming Extraordinary Works of the Spirit within Cessationist Theology

The Book of Revelation is inspired. Modern visions, auditions, and “prophecies” are not inspired, because the canon of the Bible is complete. However, these modern visions and auditions may be analogous to the Book of Revelation, just as modern preaching is analogous to apostolic preaching. Like modern preaching, modern intuitive speech has authority only insofar as it bases itself on the final infallible divine authority of Scripture.

Modern intuitive phenomena must be subject to the same restraints that are placed on preaching. Everything must be checked for conformity to Scripture.

The three categories of prophetic, kingly, and priestly gifts are not rigidly separated from one another.

All the gifts mentioned in Romans 12, 1 Corinthians 12, and Ephesians 4 can be roughly classified as prophetic, kingly, or priestly.

Vern Sheridan Poythress

Machen, What is Faith. p. 129

Certainly if there be no absolute law of God, there can be no consciousness of sin; and if there be no consciousness of sin, there can be no faith in the Saviour Jesus Christ. It is no wonder that many persons regard Jesus as a "Christ life" into which they are perfectly able, without more ado, to enter; it is no wonder that they regard their lives as differing only in degree from His. They will never catch a real a glimpse of the majesty of His person, they will never understand His redeeming work, until they come again into contact with the majestyof the law. Then and then only will they recognize their sin and need, and so come to that renunciation of all confidence in themselvees which is the basis of faith.

The Biblical Gospel

In the midst of all my uncertainty, I sense the gravity of that injunction to preach the Gospel. This presupposes I understand what was preached and that injunction to preach. The biblical Gospel is not an all inclusive message in terms of content. That is, the biblical Gospel is not just any good news. According to the Scripture, it is the message preached through which men and women are saved, are being saved, and will be saved, meaning that there is something from which they must be saved and that there is a means of Salvation procured.

Certainly, the Gospel is not the law, namely “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, strength or love your neighbor as yourself” (Luke 10:27). How could it be? For the law brings about death. The law is the enunciation of God's standard that men are obligated to observe and do, for if God has spoken, men must listen. The Law emphatically exposes our inability to obey and fulfill it. Even Paul reveals “I would not have known what sin was except through the law” (Romans 7:7). Earlier in Romans Paul employs a falling short metaphor for sin speaking about the infinite depth, width, height and breadth that man - of his own will or work - cannot ascend or cross. Man cannot remedy sin.

The primacy of this sin problem is not that it is an offense against government or brother. Sin is an offense against God, Himself. Consequently, God stands over and against men and women in judgment. The Biblical Gospel is a heralded message declaring what God has done in Jesus Christ reconcile us to God propitiating God's just wrath held because of sinners who have offended Him.

Jesus has completely and perfectly obeyed the Law for sinners and God haters who couldn't and wouldn't keep it. "He was obedient to death, even death on a cross" (Philippians 2:8) “becoming sin for us that we might become the righteousness of God in him” (2 Corinthians 5:21). Again, “He died to save His people from their sins” Matthew 1:21 vicariously, made the substitutionary atonement for sinners. God who is rich in mercy demonstrated His own love toward His people so that they will be delivered from the curse of the law so that they will taste and see and know the salvation of the Lord.

The declarative announcement that Jesus saves begs the question, “How does He save?” which, according to Jesus, is the same as asking, “How shall a man be born again?” because God has chosen to work by means. Answer: “For by grace are you saved through faith not of works" (Ephesians 2:8-9). “If you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord and believe in your heart God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved” (Romans 10:9). Therefore, Biblical faith is faith in “Christ and Him crucified.” It acknowledges "Jesus is the Christ and that He is a rewarder of those that diligently seek him” (Hebrews 11:6). The great credo is wonderfully articulate. Salvation is wrought by the Spirit through means of the Scriptures alone by Grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone to the glory of God alone.

II Timothy 1

1

^{1 2} Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God for the promise of life in Christ Jesus,

2

to Timothy, my dear child: grace, mercy, and peace from God the Father and Christ Jesus our Lord.

3

I am grateful to God, whom I worship with a clear conscience as my ancestors did, ³ as I remember you constantly in my prayers, night and day.

4

⁴ I yearn to see you again, recalling your tears, so that I may be filled with joy,

5

as I recall your sincere faith that first lived in your grandmother Lois and in your mother Eunice and that I am confident lives also in you.

6

For this reason, I remind you to stir into flame the gift of God ⁵ that you have through the imposition of my hands.

7

For God did not give us a spirit of cowardice but rather of power and love and self-control.

8

So do not be ashamed of your testimony to our Lord, ⁶ nor of me, a prisoner for his sake; but bear your share of hardship for the gospel with the strength that comes from God.

9

⁷ He saved us and called us to a holy life, not according to our works but according to his own design and the grace bestowed on us in Christ Jesus before time began,

10

but now made manifest through the appearance of our savior Christ Jesus, who destroyed death and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel,

11

⁸ for which I was appointed preacher and apostle and teacher.

12

⁹ On this account I am suffering these things; but I am not ashamed, for I know him in whom I have believed and am confident that he is able to guard what has been entrusted to me until that day.

13

Take as your norm the sound words that you heard from me, in the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus.

14

Guard this rich trust with the help of the holy Spirit that dwells within us.

15

¹⁰ You know that everyone in Asia deserted me, including Phygelus and Hermogenes.

16

¹¹ May the Lord grant mercy to the family of Onesiphorus because he often gave me new heart and was not ashamed of my chains.

17

But when he came to Rome, he promptly searched for me and found me.

18

May the Lord grant him to find mercy from the Lord ¹² on that day. And you know very well the services he rendered in Ephesus.

Æneid - Vergil

Dedication

The First Book of the Æneis

The Second Book of the Æneis

The Third Book of the Æneis

The Fourth Book of the Æneis

The Fifth Book of the Æneis

The Sixth Book of the Æneis

The Seventh Book of the Æneis

The Eighth Book of the Æneis

The Ninth Book of the Æneis

The Tenth Book of the Æneis

The Eleventh Book of the Æneis

The Twelfth Book of the Æneis

Postscript to the Reader

History

It seems that I have enjoyed the presumptuous life. I have heard many arduous conclusions called forth in strength of so called factual ardor having complacently absorbed many conclusions I should have questioned. Who was Helen Keller? What was the Plague that claimed the life of 90% of New Englanders in 1617? Pilgrim was a termed coined in the nineteenth century?
History calls forth the reality of events and happenings that once occurred in a particular manner for a particular reason through particular agents. Yet, maybe by the force of my textbooks, I have listened to the settling niceties and well refurbished stories that retell historical actions according to a different prerogative. These stories heroify villains and demean giants all for a kind of monumental leveling that covers controversy.
As I survey my own grasp of history, I am ashamed to think I have once celebrated the lives of men and women I now see as wicked. I have supported institutions I now see as corrupt. The ideas and individuals I thought were virtuous, I now have good reason to question or despise. While textbooks tone down wars odiousness, and the enduring travesty of mans insatiable desire for conquest, the reality of on-going horrors are neglected.
Today, evangelicals are no better. Many among us would rather hear feel good messages filled with half-truths than hear the truth of the matter of the fact. While the Gospel's historical reality entails the suffering, bleeding, wounding, stripes and cruxifiction of God, so called "evangelicals" would rather rent the good news of the Jack-in-the-box Jesus because he comes out after a few cranks. We are so easily beguiled from the true nature of actual events and seemingly disinterested in the truth.

Human Depravity
by R.C. Sproul

As we said in the previous chapter, a common point of debate among theologians focuses on the question, are human beings basically good or basically evil? The hinge upon which the argument turns is the word "basically." It is a virtual universal consensus that nobody is perfect. We accept the maxim: "To err is human."

The Bible says that "all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God" (Romans 3:23). Despite this verdict on human shortcomings, the idea persists in our humanistically dominated culture that sin is something peripheral or tangential to our nature. Indeed, we are flawed by sin. Our moral records exhibit blemishes. But somehow we think that our evil deeds reside at the rim or edge of our character and never penetrate to the core. Basically, it is assumed, people are inherently good.

After being rescued from captivity in Iraq and experiencing firsthand the corrupt methods of Saddam Hussein, one American hostage remarked, "Despite all that I endured I never lost my confidence in the basic goodness of people." Perhaps this view rests in part on a sliding scale of the relative goodness or wickedness of people. Obviously some people are far more wicked than others. Next to Saddam Hussein or Adolf Hitler the ordinary run-of-the-mill sinner looks like a saint. But if we lift our gaze to the ultimate standard of goodness - the holy character of God - we realize that what appears to be a basic goodness on an earthly level is corrupt to the core..

The Bible teaches the total depravity of the human race. Total depravity means radical corruption. We must be careful to note the difference between total depravity and "utter" depravity. To be utterly depraved is to be as wicked as one could possibly be. Hitler was extremely depraved, but he could have been worse than he was. I am sinner. Yet I could sin more often and more severely than I actually do. I am not utterly depraved, but I am totally depraved. For total depravity means that I and everyone else are
depraved or corrupt in the totality of our being. There is no part of us that is left untouched by sin. Our minds, our wills, and our bodies are affected by evil. We speak sinful words, do sinful deeds, have impure thoughts. Our very bodies suffer from the ravages of sin.

Perhaps "radical corruption" is a better term to describe our fallen condition than "total depravity." I am using the word "radical" not so much to mean "extreme," but to lean more heavily on its original meaning. "Radical" comes from the Latin word for "root" or "core." Our problem with sin is that it is rooted in the core of our being. It permeates our hearts. It is because sin is at our core and not merely at the exterior of our lives that the Bible says: "There is none righteous, no not one; there is none who understands; there is none who seeks after God. They have all turned aside; they have together become unprofitable; there is none who does good, no, not one." Romans 3:10-12

It is because of this condition that the verdict of Scripture is heard: we are "dead in trespasses and sins" (Ephesians 2:1); we are "sold under sin" (Romans 7:14); we are in "captivity to the law of sin" (Romans 7:23); and "by nature children of wrath (Ephesians 2:3). Only by the quickening power of the Holy Spirit may we be brought out of this state of spiritual death. It is God who makes us alive as we become His craftsmanship (Ephesians 2:1-10).

Summary:

1. Humanism sees sin at the edge or periphery of human life. It considers
human beings to be basically good.

2. Biblical Christianity teaches that sin permeates the core of our life.

3. Total depravity is not utter depravity. We are not as wicked as we
possibly could be.

4. Radical corruption points to the core sinfulness of our hearts.

Biblical passages for reflection:
Jeremiah 17:9
Romans 8:1-11
Ephesians 2:1-3
Ephesians 4:17-19
1 John 1:8-10

Excerpt from Essential Truths Of The Christian Faith by R. C. Sproul © pages 147-149 (Tyndale 1992)

Two details of issue

I was confronted on an assertion that I made in class. I realized that I often come to conclusions too quickly and sucker under with even little confrontation. In class I had asserted that Machen said that his teacher's definition of Miracles was sound or orthodox. His teacher said "A Miracle is an event in the external world that is wrought by the immediate power of God" (Machen 102). I was immediately asked, ow does he know? I initial thought to myself "Who do you think you are to question Machen?" I should have asked, however, What reasons do you have to doubt His assertion? In retrospect many arguments to which I have listen and in which I have participated are directed at the man or argumentum ad hominem. It must also be noted that ideas, definitions, and conclusion that are sound ought to have rational basis. Therefore, I ought to patiently and contemplatively deal with all questions for the sake of their concern for the truth. The knowledge of the truth must be aim of all my inquiries and endeavors. For "the truth will set us free."

McGrew asked me today if I would have a suggestions for him. Immediately I thought he was going to give me a suggestion. So I was a little surprised at his question. I fumbled around with some initial thoughts that were fragmented and displaced. I then said it would help if you help us see the relevance of the course. Ashamedly, in retrospect, I spoke in haste because he has explained and reexplained why these matters of apologetics are so important and good. He has explained the content and its extensions, entailments, and implications. There are gaps. However, I have yet to deal with what he has taught that is why I have failed to comprehend the profound relevance of the course content. I feel often that as a student I cannot adequately aid an accomplished professor in his attempt to better his class because he understands the content more fully and comprehensively than I. A course is ultimately subservient to the content; therefore, a student's estimation of a course is subject to his understanding of the content. The class has been thus far helpful because I have been forced to think about how I think, what I know.

The Bridge of History Over the Gulf of Time

http://gerald-massey.org.uk/cooper/b_gulf_of_time.htm

INTRODUCTION

I. THE ARCH
OF SCIENCE

II. THE ARCH
OF THE FRENCH REVOLUTION.

III. THE ARCH
OF OLIVER CROMWELL.

IV. THE ARCH
OF MARTIN LUTHER.

V. THE ARCH
OF THE INVENTION OF PRINTING.

VI. THE ARCH
OF JOHN WYCKLIFFE.

VII. THE ARCH
OF MAGNA CHARTA.

VIII. THE ARCH OF THE
CRUSADES.

IX. ARCH OF WILLIAM
THE CONQUEROR.

X. THE ARCH
OF DARKNESS.

XI. THE ARCH
OF KING ALFRED.

XIII. THE ARCH
OF MOHAMMED.

XIV. THE ARCH
OF AUGUSTINE.

XV. THE ARCH
OF EARTHQUAKE.

XVI. THE ARCH
OF CONSTANTINE THE GREAT.

XVII. THE ARCH
OF PERSECUTION.

XVIII. and XIX. THE
ARCH OF THE FATHERS; THE
ARCH OF THE APOSTLES.

"LEBEN JESU":
DR. DAVID FRIEDRICH
STRAUSS.

MATTHEW'S
GOSPEL.

MARK'S GOSPEL.

LUKE'S GOSPEL.

JOHN'S GOSPEL.

THE CONCLUDING
EVIDENCES.

One-Year Tract Bible Reading Plan

http://www.gnpcb.org/esv/share/rss2.0/one.year.tract/

Justice

Although the ceremonial or Levitical precepts are done away with by the blood and flesh of Jesus, the moral Law of God is not. Its demands, however, are appeased by the same Obedient-Suffering-Servant, namely Jesus Christ. The two aspects of the moral law demanded that men perfectly love God with all heart, soul, mind, and strength and that they perfectly love their neighbors as themselves. The Ten Commandments exhibit ten moral laws that seem externally minded, while Jesus declares their internal significance. Jesus said, “'You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery.’ But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lustful intent has already committed adultery with her in his heart'” (Matthew 5:27-30). The stipulations required by such imperatives cause men to shudder because of the heaviness of the demand. “There is none righteous no not one... none who seeks for God” (Romans 3:10-11). It is obvious that the holiness of God is not observed by men, but profaned by all men. Therefore all men by nature and according to justice are offenders of God, sinners against the holy-infinite God. Consequently, men deserve a proportionate judicial verdict, eternal condemnation.

The Blood of Jesus

While the impetus for which one can enter into the Holiest is Jesus' blood, the reason that a blood sacrifice is offered is on account of sin. “Sin is the transgression of the law” (1 John 3:4). If the transgression of the law is sin, then the one who gave the law is the one offended by the sin of the law. “Now the law not only forbids the doing of evil, whether by thought, word, or deed, but also commands the doing of good. So to omit the good commanded is sin, as well (or ill) as is the doing of evil that is forbidden... Whatever transgresses the law of God... whether it break an affirmative or a negative precept [is sin]” (Ralph Venning, 25). Since it is God's law, sin is an offense against God. Consequently, God decrees that “without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness of sins” (Hebrews 9:22). That is, God demands a penalty proportionate to the offense; however, the greatest sacrifice a man could offer, namely his life, is not sufficient because man is finite. The payment would not fit the offense. In order to fulfill God's justice, God sent Himself in the person of His Son to offer a blood sacrifice. That is, the Lord Jesus Christ sacrificed his own life as a propitiation for the sins of His people. Therefore, Jesus' life, death, burial, and resurrection accomplished a way to God, a new and living way.

Arrogance

I hate arrogance. I hate it my obsession with my ideas. I hate arrogance when I attest to an idea with self-exalting resolve, when I esteem my prerogative as authoritative on the basis of my own attestation, and when I obsessively claim esoteric truth while the truth is diminished not by neglect but by relegation. If we care for the truth we will care for proportions and manner. That is, words, concepts, ideas, qualities have a portion that we often neglect in our opinions. We use particular terms inadequately; therefore, in our attempt to proclaim the truth we relegate the truth by deemphasis or over emphasis.

May God grant us discernment as we strive toward the truth. Too many people claim a right position hatefully and a wrong position "lovingly."
May this not be true of us.

Note: Schedules seem like important and helpful ideas

Sometimes it is difficult to schedule my appointments in a way that complements my schedule. Consequently, I awake and crash at peculiar hours.

As I survey my will to rise
and gaze upon my work
I see the ways I should have gone
The ways I should walked

The Law appointed here before
commends that I obey
Commands that tell the world of GOD
About His perfect way

As I survey the Word of Law
Its call to righteousness
Where God has spoken
Yes and No about His covenant

How can a man fufill that Word?
How can he walk by faith?
How can He keep from one offense?
From making one mistake?

As I survey my will to rise
to listen to that Word
I love the World too much to part
too much to follow God

I love the spoil of my misdeeds
the gain of my offence
I hate that Word, the Word of God
for what the Law has said

As I survey the Law of God
My sin abounds the more
I will not listen thou I know
God will judge the world

Oh how God intervenes to save
His people from their sin
The Lamb of God, Jesus the Christ
Has died and rose again

He has obeyed the Law of God
He has fulfilled it all
He has transformed my will and way
By suffering and scorn

The theme of Blood

When John the Baptist exclaimed, "Behold the Lamb of God that taketh away the sin of the world." Would he not have understood the function of the pascal lamb? Would not he know that the Lamb was slaughtered as a offering for sin? John is proclaiming in his day that God's promised Messiah was standing before him. That this God-Man is the Lamb who will drink the cup of the Father's wrath to save his people from their sins. And still the people think that the promised messiah was going to be a political figure head? Seriously? But the Messiah had to suffer, and die in order to procure salvation for His people







'

THE GLORIOUS POWER OF THE BLOOD OF JESUS, and the wonderful blessings procured for us by it

Canons of Dort

FIRST HEAD OF DOCTRINE. DIVINE ELECTION AND REPROBATION

FIRST HEAD: ARTICLE 1. As all men have sinned in Adam, lie under the curse, and are deserving of eternal death, God would have done no injustice by leaving them all to perish and delivering them over to condemnation on account of sin, according to the words of the apostle: "that every mouth may be silenced and the whole world held accountable to God." (Rom 3:19). And: "for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God," (Rom 3:23). And: "For the wages of sin is death." (Rom 6:23).

FIRST HEAD: ARTICLE 2. but in this the love of God was manifested, that He "sent his one and only Son into the world, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life." (1 John 4:9, John 3:16).

FIRST HEAD: ARTICLE 3. And that men may be brought to believe, God mercifully sends the messengers of these most joyful tiding to whom He will and at what time He pleases; by whose ministry men are called to repentance and faith in Christ crucified. "How, then, can they call on the one they have not believed in? And how can they believe in the one of whom they have not heard? And how can they hear without someone preaching to them? And how can they preach unless they are sent?" (Rom 10:14-15).

FIRST HEAD: ARTICLE 4. The wrath of God abides upon those who believe not this gospel. But such as receive it and embrace Jesus the Savior by a true and living faith are by Him delivered from the wrath of God and from destruction, and have the gift of eternal life conferred upon them.

FIRST HEAD: ARTICLE 5. The cause or guilt of this unbelief as well as of all other sins is no wise in God, but in man himself; whereas faith in Jesus Christ and salvation through Him is the free gift of God, as it is written: "For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith--and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God" (Eph 2:8). Likewise: "For it has been granted to you on behalf of Christ not only to believe on him, but also to suffer for him" (Phil 1:29)

FIRST HEAD: ARTICLE 6. That some receive the gift of faith from God, and others do not receive it, proceeds from God's eternal decree. "For now unto God are all his works from the beginning of the world" (Acts 15:18 A.V.). "who works out everything in conformity with the purpose of his will" (Eph 1:11). According to which decree He graciously softens the hearts of the elect, however obstinate, and inclines them to believe; while He leaves the non-elect in His just judgment to their own wickedness and obduracy. And herein is especially displayed the profound, the merciful, and at the same time the righteous discrimination between men equally involved in ruin; or that decree of election and reprobation, revealed in the Word of God, which, though men of perverse, impure, and unstable minds wrest it to their own destruction, yet to holy and pious souls affords unspeakable consolation.

FIRST HEAD: ARTICLE 7. Election is the unchangeable purpose of God, whereby, before the foundation of the world, He has out of mere grace, according to the sovereign good pleasure of His own will, chosen from the whole human race, which had fallen through their own fault from the primitive state of rectitude into sin and destruction, a certain number of persons to redemption in Christ, whom He from eternity appointed the Mediator and Head of the elect and the foundation of salvation. This elect number, though by nature neither better nor more deserving than others, but with them involved in one common misery, God has decreed to give to Christ to be saved by Him, and effectually to call an draw them to His communion by His Word and Spirit; to bestow upon them true faith, justification, and sanctification; and having powerfully preserved them in the fellowship of His son, finally to glorify them for the demonstration of His mercy, and for the praise of the riches of His glorious grace; as it is written "For he chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight. In love he predestined us to be adopted as his sons through Jesus Christ, in accordance with his pleasure and will-- to the praise of his glorious grace, which he has freely given us in the One he loves." (Eph 1:4-6). And elsewhere: "And those he predestined, he also called; those he called, he also justified; those he justified, he also glorified." (Rom 8:30).

FIRST HEAD: ARTICLE 8. There are not various decrees of election, but one and the same decree respecting all those who shall be saved, both under the Old and New Testament; since the Scripture declares the good pleasure, purpose, and counsel of the divine will to be one, according to which He has chosen us from eternity, both to grace and to glory, to salvation and to the way of salvation, which He has ordained that we should walk therein (Eph 1:4, 5; 2:10).

FIRST HEAD: ARTICLE 9. This election was not founded upon foreseen faith and the obedience of faith, holiness, or any other good quality or disposition in man, as the prerequisite, cause, or condition of which it depended; but men are chosen to faith and to the obedience of faith, holiness, etc. Therefore election is the fountain of every saving good, from which proceed faith, holiness, and the other gifts of salvation, and finally eternal life itself, as its fruits and effects, according to the testimony of the apostle: "For he chose us (not because we were, but) in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight." (Eph 1:4).

FIRST HEAD: ARTICLE 10. The good pleasure of God is the sole cause of this gracious election; which does not consist herein that out of all possible qualities and actions of men God has chosen some as a condition of salvation, but that He was pleased out of the common mass of sinners to adopt some certain persons as a peculiar people to Himself, as it is written: "Yet, before the twins were born or had done anything good or bad--in order that God's purpose in election might stand: not by works but by him who calls--she (Rebekah) was told, 'The older will serve the younger.' Just as it is written: 'Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated.'" (Rom 9:11-13). "When the Gentiles heard this, they were glad and honored the word of the Lord; and all who were appointed for eternal life believed." (Acts 13:48).

FIRST HEAD: ARTICLE 11. And as God Himself is most wise, unchangeable, omniscient, and omnipotent, so the election made by Him can neither be interrupted nor changed, recalled, or annulled; neither can the elect be cast away, nor their number diminished.

FIRST HEAD: ARTICLE 12. The elect in due time, though in various degrees and in different measures, attain the assurance of this their eternal and unchangeable election, not by inquisitively prying into the secret and deep things of God, but by observing in themselves with a spiritual joy and holy pleasure the infallible fruits of election pointed out in the Word of God - such as, a true faith in Christ, filial fear, a godly sorrow for sin, a hungering and thirsting after righteousness, etc.

FIRST HEAD: ARTICLE 13. The sense and certainty of this election afford to the children of God additional matter for daily humiliation before Him, for adoring the depth of His mercies, for cleansing themselves, and rendering grateful returns of ardent love to Him who first manifested so great love towards them. The consideration of this doctrine of election is so far from encouraging remissness in the observance of the divine commands or from sinking men in carnal security, that these, in the just judgment of God, are the usual effects of rash presumption or of idle and wanton trifling with the grace of election, in those who refuse to walk in the ways of the elect.

FIRST HEAD: ARTICLE 14. As the doctrine of election by the most wise counsel of God was declared by the prophets, by Christ Himself, and by the apostles, and is clearly revealed in the Scriptures both of the Old and the New Testament, so it is still to be published in due time and place in the Church of God, for which it was peculiarly designed, provided it be done with reverence, in the spirit of discretion and piety, for the glory of God's most holy Name, and for enlivening and comforting His people, without vainly attempting to investigate the secret ways of the Most High (Acts 20:27; Rom 11:33f; 12:3; Heb 6:17f).

FIRST HEAD: ARTICLE 15. What peculiarly tends to illustrate and recommend to us the eternal and unmerited grace of election is the express testimony of sacred Scripture that not all, but some only, are elected, while others are passed by in the eternal decree; whom God, out of His sovereign, most just, irreprehensible, and unchangeable good pleasure, has decreed to leave in the common misery into which they have willfully plunged themselves, and not to bestow upon them saving faith and the grace of conversion; but, permitting them in His just judgment to follow their own ways, at last, for the declaration of His justice, to condemn and punish them forever, not only on account of their unbelief, but also for all their other sins. And this is the decree of reprobation, which by no means makes God the Author of sin (the very though of which is blasphemy), but declares Him to be an awful, irreprehensible, and righteous Judge and Avenger thereof.

FIRST HEAD: ARTICLE 16. Those in whom a living faith in Christ, and assured confidence of soul, peace of conscience, an earnest endeavor after filial obedience, a glorying in God through Christ, is not as yet strongly felt, and who nevertheless make use of the means which God has appointed for working these graces in us, ought not to be alarmed at the mention of reprobation, nor to rank themselves among the reprobate, but diligently to persevere in the use of means, and with ardent desires devoutly and humble to wait for a season of richer grace. Much less cause to be terrified by the doctrine of reprobation have they who, though they seriously desire to be turned to God, to please Him only, and to be delivered from the body of death, cannot yet reach that measure of holiness and faith to which they aspire; since a merciful God has promised that He will not quench the smoking flax, nor break the bruised reed. But this doctrine is justly terrible to those who, regardless of God and of the Savior Jesus Christ, have wholly given themselves up to the cares of the world and the pleasures of the flesh, so long as they are not seriously converted to God.

FIRST HEAD: ARTICLE 17. Since we are to judge of the will of God from His Word, which testifies that the children of believers are holy, not by nature, but in virtue of the covenant of grace, in which they together with the parents are comprehended, godly parents ought not to doubt the election and salvation of their children whom it pleases God to call out of this life in their infancy (Gen 17:7; Acts 2:39; 1 Cor 7:14).

FIRST HEAD: ARTICLE 18. To those who murmur at the free grace of election and the just severity of reprobation we answer with the apostle "But who are you, O man, to talk back to God?" (Rom 9:20), and quote the language of our Savior: "Don't I have the right to do what I want with my own?" (Matt 20:15). And therefore, with holy adoration of these mysteries, we exclaim in the words of the apostle: "Oh, the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable his judgments, and his paths beyond tracing out! 'Who has known the mind of the Lord? Or who has been his counselor?' 'Who has ever given to God, that God should repay him?' For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be the glory forever! Amen." (Rom 11:33-36).

Grammar and its effect and affect

"Grammar is the structured system that underlies our language and that the basic unit of language structure is the sentence" (Max Morenburg, p.3)

Reading for Advanced Grammar

I am reading a few different Grammar books. It may sound uninviting or boring but I have found it otherwise. The matters that emanate from the study of Grammar may shock you. As I have found there are a number of philosophical matters and theological matters that proceed from ones perception of language, particularly grammar apprehension. The way in which an individual learns how things and symbols relate has bearing on his/ her capacity to communicate and process other things and symbols. One question that naturally rises out of a study of grammar pertains to use and rules or, if you would rather, rules and use. That is, Do rules dictate correct and incorrect usage of words, phrases, sentences, etc. or are rules derived from cultural usage?

Other matters that emerge pertain to so called "pre-linguistic sentiment." Do words represent sentiments that precede their symbols? Are symbols such that they usurp images that could exist without symbols?

Jack Conner in his A Grammar of Standard English submits that 'deictic' words call to mind images (p. 5), while 'syntactic' words are exclusively functional or empty. One note that he inserts after these is, " it is not the word itself that is functional and not lexical; it is the word as the writer uses it" (p. 5). Therefore, according to Conner, "Words mean what the writer or speaker intends it to mean... The business of the reader is to discover what the writer or speaker intended, and the dictionary may or may not help him."

Assessment

Teachers are obligated to attend to specific objectives that their class should fulfill. These objectives are determined by the state without the direct consent of its teachers. It is supposed that they are an educated bunch distinguishing what belongs to a foundational formal education. In response, teachers are responsible to prove that every student is learning certain material. It is also supposed that if teachers can swallow hard and fudge a few numbers, then they can demonstrate that all their students are achieving a standard for which they were never desirous.
Now, many would say that numbers fail to prove that a student is learning, while others declare that numbers empirically do. Teachers have been known to prove that all students are learning by virtue of assessment. That is, of course, they practice assessment in their classroom synthesizing the two (instruction and assessment). But one may ask: how can teachers be sure that learning is measure by their tools? How can one respond? They do by virtue of their tools. It is true that good numbers are praised by the state. It is true that the state praises education on these basis; however, the question remains unanswered.
It is true that if you attend to the demands of the state, as it demands, regardless if bribery is involved, then you will be rewarded. Teachers are taught to swallow hard, accept the baggage for the sake of its gold. If teachers follow the states proscription exceedingly better than others they are rewarded proportionately. This probably would be labeled indentured servantry by others, but the state likes to call it free and appropriate education. In retrospect, assessment proves that students can preform a skill or regurgitate material. However, teachers are still subject to a system over and above education. For educators have defined what belongs to education so that the educator's pedagogy can assume that they are educating as well. But educators have long built structures before assessing the strength of its foundation. And they have redefined assessment so that their measurement tools no longer assess qualitatively. They are only adept to measure quantitatively so that this circle has retrieved itself.

Economics considered

Clason's Concerns Measured

In the Richest Man in Babylon, George S. Clason advocates three laws that explain how to successfully acquiring wealth. He articulates a way toward fiscal liberty to avoid the perils of debt. However, Clason's principles disguise the reality of acquisitions overpowering influence on those who seek it. These principles are a most dangerous trap.
Clason caricatures persons, readily embodying citizens who have much and citizens who have little. He depicts affluent men who understand the laws of acquisition, middle-class men who live from payday to payday, and slaves who seemly have no capacity to have financial liberty. Arkad is the richest man in Babylon; he willingly pronounces practical principles that he learned from Algemesh, who preceded Arkad as the richest man in Babylon. Bansir and Kobbi, although free, laboriously scrape the bottom of the tin in order to meet the demands of their financial obligations. And Dabasir became a slave because he had spent more than he had made.
At the end of the book, Alfred H. Shrewsbury, a professor of archeology finds five tablets that tell the story of Dabasir, a man whose own debt forces him to seek help. Shrewsbury listens as Dabsir tells about the three principles of acquiring wealth. He informs Shrewsbury about acquisition (how to acquire money), possession (how to keep money), and accumulation (how to use money). Dabasir spends himself into slavery because of his financial incompetence; yet, through his determination, he masters his miserable circumstances. Shrewsbury says: “Here comes an old chap out of the dust-covered ruins of Babylon to offer a way that I had never heard to pay off my debts and at the same time acquire gold to jingle in my wallet (Clason, 107).” These laws that the professor happened upon are eminently helpful; their aim complements the nature of the author's scheme.

Bansir and Kobbi live day to day on the verge of financial failure. They complain about their enslavement to their monetary demands. Bansir exclaims, “Income!” convinced that income was a necessary want that would bring happiness and contentment to him (6). Clason argues that desire must precede acquisition and acquisition is the primacy for happiness. He says, “Wealth is a power... that brings delight for the senses and gratification for the soul (11).”
Bansir and Kobbi are without wealth even as they earnestly work in their respectable trades. They observe that their pouches are empty, so they seek means that might foster a flow of income. They seek counsel from Arkad, the richest man in Babylon; he willingly pronounces practical principles that he learned from Algemesh, who preceded Arkad as the richest man in Babylon. Algemesh provides the way towards acquisition, possession and accumulation: the three laws of successfully acquiring wealth.
Firstly, ones income provides a means of acquisition; however, if he/she spends as much as he/she makes he/she pays everyone else but himself/herself. Furthermore, if he/she determines what he/she needs as a result of what he/she possesses: his/her necessities aptly become proportional to his/her income. Algemesh taught Arkad that the farmer who kept one egg for every ten he gave away, acquired an income. Arkad insisted on setting aside ten percent of all his income because “A part of all you have earned is yours to keep (17).”
Secondly, possession means keeping what you have acquired. In order to keep what you have accumulated contemplatively consider where and who best accommodates a risk-free investment. Arkad experienced the folly of partnering with someone in an investment foreign to both of them. He invested in a bricklayer who was interested in jewelry. He lost all his earnings. Arkad says, “Advice is one thing freely given away; yet, watch that you only take what is worth having (17).” He qualifies his proposition by saying, “seek advice from those competent through their experience to give it.” Keeping what you have worked so diligently to accumulate demands just as much circumspection as your endeavor to accumulate. “It is so easy to lend. If lent unwisely it is difficult to get back (74).” As one accumulates it becomes easier and easier to become imprudent and liberal. Mathon, a prudent and wise money lender, offered advice to Rodan, who was contemplating whether or not he should lend his hard-earned stash of fifty gold pieces to his brother-in-law. He said, “better a little caution than a great regret (88).” Mathon conjectured about how tragic it is to bring upon yourself the burdens of the ones you are helping. Out of the many ways one can lose money, one consists in imprudent investments with inexperienced partners; another consists in helping others to the extent that their burden becomes your burden.
Lastly, accumulation consists of the modes and means of how one invests his money making it work to acquire more money. If one finds profitable employment for his money, he necessarily accommodates profitable investments. “Put each coin to laboring that it may reproduce its kind even as the flocks of the field and help bring thee income, a stream of wealth that shall flow constantly into thy purse (32).” Bansir fancied a flow of gold that would come no matter if he stayed seated or if he traveled to distant lands and profitable investments precedes accumulation.
Clason plainly articulates in the forward of the book that his purpose is to inspire his readers to grow bank accounts, to grow greater financial success and to provide incomes for the future. Clason caricatures Algemesh, Arkad, and Methon to disseminate his message. Although, Clason is full of practical advice and wisdom concerning what is now finances, he offers a program that mediates a method for monetary gain. He overlooks its overpowering influence on those who seek it. He does not tell his readers that “the love of money is the root of all evil.” Conversely, the Apostle Paul said, “Those who want to get rich fall into temptation and a snare and many foolish and harmful desires which plunge men into ruin and destruction. For the love of money is a root of all sorts of evil, and some by longing for it have wandered away from the faith... But flee from these things, you man of God; and pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, perseverance, and gentleness. Fight the good fight of faith; take hold of the eternal life to which you were called… (I Tim 6:9-12)”
Jesus taught many parables that included characters with monetary problems; yet, He emphasized the eternal over the immediate. The Scriptures may condone Clason's method; however, they condemn his motives. Clason offers practical advice that closely resembles wisdom inherent in biblical stewardship like debt reduction and monetary discernment. Clason articulates the dangers inherent in unpaid debts. Debt devastates people. Dabasir's debts took control of him, and he became a slave because of his incompetence. He notes, “being young and without experience, I did not know that he who spends more than he earns is sowing the winds of needless self-indulgence from which he is sure to reap the whirlwinds of trouble and humiliation (Clason, 97).” Proverbs says: “The plans of the diligent lead to profit as surely as haste leads to poverty (Proverbs 21:5).” Clearly, Clason's concern for monetary wisdom coincides with biblical principals concerning practical insights implicitly and explicitly interwoven in Scripture.
As His scheme embraces acquisition, however, it mitigates the dangers that emanate from a love of money. “Where your treasure is there shall your heart be also (Matt 6.).” Wealth is a power and the power is a consequence of acquisition. Acquisition is a necessary component in any quest for monetary success (11). Yet, acquisition, possession and accumulation are practical expressions that run on the basis of their result. Result-oriented programs fail to accommodate good values.
Money provides the means to accumulate all the worldly necessities of any physically dependent entity; yet, Jesus says, “Do not be worried about your life, as to what you will eat or what you will drink; nor for your body, as to what you will put on. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing?” He offers the reason in one passage before, “No one can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to one and despise the other You cannot serve God and wealth.”And this proposition is predicated upon, “For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.” Thus Jesus says, “Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven.”