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New Look for Theophilos
September 16, 2009 | 
Author This is the new look of the Theophilos website. Everything which was on the old site is accessible in this one. Most of the links are now on the “Links” menu tab at the top, or in the Category Menu on the side. This should be much easier to navigate.
The old “frames” pages can be accessed by the submenu “Living Faith by Grace” under “The
Christian Life” menu.
I am planning to add significant new material here shortly.
My Book Selections
The books which I have selected here I have enjoyed reading and are generally relevant to my topics.
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If you have a book which you would like to get, I can add it here so you can order it. Just use the “Contact Me” menu item to let me know the title and author.
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- Who Made God
- Dr. Peter Kreeft
Biblical Counseling
Books I Like
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- If Grace Is True
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- New Look for Theophilos
- Catastrophe
- The Last Christian on Earth
- The Misunderstood God
- The Pressure’s Off
- Roll Away Your Stone
- The True Believer
- The Language of God
- The Twilight of Atheism
- The shaping of Rationality
- The Road to Serfdom
- Liberal Fascism
- America Alone
- How We Believe
- Scaling the Secular City
- Total Truth
- No Doubt About It
- The Inescapable Love of God
- Unveiling Mysteries of the Bible
- Five Views on Apologetics
- Absolutely Free
- Pagan Christianity?: Exploring the Roots of Our Church Practices
- Sequel to Pagan Christianity
Christian Living
- My Book Selections
- Roll Away Your Stone
- The Astonished Heart
- No Condemnation
- GFL Study Forum • View topic – New Life Plan
- GFL Study Forum • View topic – What is Growing in Grace?
Christianity
- A Passion for Truth
- Introduction to Old Testament
- Body & Soul: Human Nature & the Crisis in Ethics
- My Book Selections
- The Last Christian on Earth
- The Misunderstood God
- The Pressure’s Off
- Total Truth
- Unveiling Mysteries of the Bible
- The Astonished Heart
- Has Christianity Failed You?
- I Don’t Have Enough Faith to Be an Atheist
- The Rebirth of Orthodoxy
- The Saving Life of Christ & The Mystery of Godliness
- The Two Covenants
- No Condemnation
- Love
- Pagan Christianity?: Exploring the Roots of Our Church Practices
- Sequel to Pagan Christianity
Conservative Political
Science & Religion
Theology
Category Post List
Amazon
- Grace
- Chosen But Free
- Has Christianity Failed You?
- I Don’t Have Enough Faith to Be an Atheist
- The Rebirth of Orthodoxy
- The Saving Life of Christ & The Mystery of Godliness
- The Two Covenants
- No Condemnation
- Jesus Calling
- Dr. Peter Kreeft
Apologetics
- My Book Selections
- No Doubt About It
- Five Views on Apologetics
- Has Christianity Failed You?
- I Don’t Have Enough Faith to Be an Atheist
- Who Made God
- Dr. Peter Kreeft
Attitude
Bible Search
Biblical Counseling
Bibliography
Books I Like
- A Passion for Truth
- If Grace Is True
- My Book Selections
- New Look for Theophilos
- Catastrophe
- The Last Christian on Earth
- The Misunderstood God
- The Pressure’s Off
- Roll Away Your Stone
- The True Believer
- The Language of God
- The Twilight of Atheism
- The shaping of Rationality
- The Road to Serfdom
- Liberal Fascism
- America Alone
- How We Believe
- Scaling the Secular City
- Total Truth
- No Doubt About It
- The Inescapable Love of God
- Unveiling Mysteries of the Bible
- Five Views on Apologetics
- Absolutely Free
- Pagan Christianity?: Exploring the Roots of Our Church Practices
- Sequel to Pagan Christianity
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- GFL Study Forum • View topic – What is sanctification?
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Christian Living
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- Roll Away Your Stone
- The Astonished Heart
- No Condemnation
- GFL Study Forum • View topic – New Life Plan
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Christianity
- A Passion for Truth
- Introduction to Old Testament
- Body & Soul: Human Nature & the Crisis in Ethics
- My Book Selections
- The Last Christian on Earth
- The Misunderstood God
- The Pressure’s Off
- Total Truth
- Unveiling Mysteries of the Bible
- The Astonished Heart
- Has Christianity Failed You?
- I Don’t Have Enough Faith to Be an Atheist
- The Rebirth of Orthodoxy
- The Saving Life of Christ & The Mystery of Godliness
- The Two Covenants
- No Condemnation
- Love
- Pagan Christianity?: Exploring the Roots of Our Church Practices
- Sequel to Pagan Christianity
Church
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- Tell me how
- GFL Study Forum • View topic – Church Muddle
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Conscience
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Grace, Faith & Life
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- The Pronunciation of the name יהוה (YHWH) – YouTube
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Index
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- How Do We Increase in Faith?
- Do you believe?
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- “Born Of Woman” vs. “Born Of God”
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academic
Tell me how
If someone tells me that the Holy Spirit or God “spoke” to them or guided them in some way, I am more interested in knowing exactly how that happened, than I am in what was said or done. Many people claim this in a very casual way, others casually accept it as a frequent occurrence.
If a preacher tells me the Holy Spirit told him, very clearly, that he was not to preach what he had prepared, and then told him what to preach. The real story is in the explanation of how that happened, not in the message. I take the comment at face value, a direct communication from God. When you stop to think about it, the Holy God of the universe contacting a person in that way would be an amazing event.
Now, if it is really a normal thinking process whereby a conclusion and decision is reached concerning an issue, then how can that be attributed to the Holy Spirit? Are the people who do this just naming the Holy Spirit for effect and authority?
Of course, it may be a result of a true understanding of your connection to the Life of Christ working in you and your response to that. That spiritual connection is what needs to be taught.
Copyright © 1996 – 2010 Daniel R. Boliek www.gflstudy.org all Rights Reserved
The Gospel
What is the Gospel?
I asked this question in a Bible study group with about twenty people. I gave them time to write out their answer. The answers were unexpectedly varied indicating that there is little common understanding of what the gospel is. Can “the gospel” have different meanings? Paul said, there was one gospel which is the death burial and resurrection of Jesus. 1Corinthians 15:1-4
The term is frequently used in preaching, teaching and Bible studies and many times seems to imply more than Paul’s statement. When used in this way, it is a term which people will define by projecting their particular idea into it, similiar to the terms “hope” and “change” which politicians use.
How many passages in the Bible can be considered the gospel, or “good news”? Many denominations preach the “Sermon on the Mount” as applicable to Christian living.
17 Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil. 18 For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled. 19 Whosoever therefore shall break one of these least commandments, and shall teach men so, he shall be called the least in the kingdom of heaven: but whosoever shall do and teach them, the same shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven. 20 For I say unto you, That except your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, ye shall in no case enter into the kingdom of heaven. Matt 5:17-20 (KJV)
Was that “good news” for the Jews He was teaching?
Here is what Jesus said to Martha in Chapter 11 of John’s Gospel.
21 Then said Martha unto Jesus, Lord, if thou hadst been here, my brother had not died. 22 But I know, that even now, whatsoever thou wilt ask of God, God will give it thee. 23 Jesus saith unto her, Thy brother shall rise again. 24 Martha saith unto him, I know that he shall rise again in the resurrection at the last day. 25 Jesus said unto her, I am the resurrection, and the life: he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live: 26 And whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die. Believest thou this? John 11:21-26 (KJV)
So what do you say the Gospel is?
John MacArthur’s book “the Gospel According to Jesus” is about “Lordship salvation” and “making” Jesus Lord in our life. Is that “Good news”?
Jesus is Lord of our life; we don’t make Him Lord of our lives.
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Copyright © 1996 – 2008 Theophilos and gflstudy.org web site. All rights reserved.
What is Saving Faith?
We know God does the saving, but what is our part? We repent and believe. Does repenting mean we must make a commitment to make Jesus the Lord of our life before we are saved?
Listen to this seven minutes of a sermon on why a Pastor thinks that a guy he is talking to can’t be saved. Click on Sermon to play audio.
Posted in Grace, Faith & Life, Life Study Series, New Covenant, Salvation, Saving Faith, The Blog | No Comments »
How do We Increase in Faith?
Christian faith is not our intellectual resolve and commitment to something, this is just religious belief.
Faith is not our hope in a promise.
Faith has to do with our experiencing the object of our faith in our heart.
God has never spoken to me, or anyone I’ve ever known, verbally, or through any means of direct revelation. He has spoken to us in His written Word. But, I know Him through a “spiritual” communication in my heart. (It is not our conscience; I will cover that in a later topic.) I believe God speaks to us spiritually with a still small voice deep in our inner being which is also sometimes called our “heart”, when we come to understand the “Truth” of His scripture for all areas of our life.
If this is true, then I understand faith to be “responding to what God puts into my heart“.
What is Growing in Grace?
There are several terms used for essentially the same process in a Christian’s life, “increasing faith”, “growing in grace”, “spiritual maturity”, and “sanctification”.
Increasing Faith 2Peter 1:5-12 Eph 4:14-24
When we talk about increasing our faith, we are talking about spiritual maturity in terms of “putting on” something new. When we were “born again”, we didn’t get a new old (old being the Flesh). We were not made righteous in the Flesh. By the grace of God, we are being changed from the image of Adam into the image of Christ. This change comes by responding to what God puts into our heart by the Holy Spirit enlightening us as to the meaning of Scripture. He is not looking for “sacrifice” but a contrite heart. The Psalms 37:4 “Delight thyself also in the LORD; and he shall give thee the desires of thine heart”. I think this means He is changing the desires of our heart, not giving us what we want.
Sanctification
Sanctification is not about us trying to clean-up our “old-nature” by obedience.
God hath from the beginning chosen you to salvation through sanctification of the Spirit and belief of the truth. –2 Thess. 2: 13.
Bob George says, “sanctification of something means it is being used for the intelligent purpose for which it was created”.
Spiritual maturity is not about what we do for God, but understanding what God does in us. It is about putting on the right thing in the right way. What comes out is our love of God and our love of others. This is the “law of Christ” and “obedience of faith”.
14 And we have seen and do testify that the Father sent the Son to be the Saviour of the world. 15 Whosoever shall confess that Jesus is the Son of God, God dwelleth in him, and he in God. 16 And we have known and believed the love that God hath to us. God is love; and he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God, and God in him.
17 Herein is our love made perfect, that we may have boldness in the day of judgment: because as he is, so are we in this world. 18 There is no fear in love; but perfect love casteth out fear: because fear hath torment. He that feareth is not made perfect in love. 19 We love him, because he first loved us. 20 If a man say, I love God, and hateth his brother, he is a liar: for he that loveth not his brother whom he hath seen, how can he love God whom he hath not seen? 21 And this commandment have we from him, That he who loveth God love his brother also. 1 John 4:14-21 (KJV)
Until we are enlightened by the Holy Spirit to really understand this part, we are probably out there giving it all we’ve got to “win” for God. Kind of like our “sacrifice” for God which He said He didn’t want. He wants us to know Him which requires a different attitude in our heart. This attitude change won’t happen until we come to understand and believe that there is nothing we can do for God. This would be kind of humbling, wouldn’t it? Scripture calls it the “offense of the cross”. It all comes from Him if we just come without any fleshly pride and commitments and allow “Christ in us” and His Word to work it out in our life.
Eph 4:21-24
21 If so be that ye have heard him, and have been taught by him, as the truth is in Jesus: 22 That ye put off concerning the former conversation the old man, which is corrupt according to the deceitful lusts; 23 And be renewed in the spirit of your mind; 24 And that ye put on the new man, which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness.Acts 20:32
32 And now, brethren, I commend you to God, and to the word of his grace, which is able to build you up, and to give you an inheritance among all them which are sanctified.
Copyright © 1996 Theophilos www.gflstudy.org
New-Life Plan
Our problem is not our sin.
Our problem is that we are spiritually dead.
GUILTY and DEAD
From a Biblical perspective, everyone is born in the image of Adam, born without the Spirit of God in them. This means that we not only have the distinction of having the same basic fallen nature of Adam, but we are also dead spiritually.
If we are guilty and dead, we not only need to be forgiven, but we need life. Jesus not only came to pay the penalty for our sins, but to give us life. Romans 5:10
Chapter two of Genesis explains how Adam was created in God’s image. And that God breathed the breath of life into man.
The soul consists of the MIND, EMOTION and WILL. Animals have this, but animals don’t consider where they came from or how they came to be. Animals don’t have the “breath of life” which God gave man.
The Bible and our experience indicates that man is BODY, SOUL and SPIRIT. Man was created by God, in the image of God. Created with free- will, the ability to choose.
An unanswerable truth, for natural man, is “how are we here” and “why are we here”? These are spiritual questions which reveal the difference between spirit and soul (man and animal).
Lack of understanding of the difference between the spirit and the “flesh” is the major misunderstanding of Christianity today. Scripture talks about the contention between the spirit and the flesh. Scripture also says God is spirit and “speaks” to us Spirit to spirit.
Posted in Christian Life, Grace, Faith & Life, New Covenant, Salvation, The Blog, The Gospel | No Comments »
Law and Grace
The law (moral and ceremonial) is what God required of Israel under the old covenant. John 1:17 Gal 3:23-25 Heb 8:10, 10:20
Legalism is a self-defined, or religiously defined set of laws (works) and expectations for satisfying our commitment to Godbased on a misunderstanding of how we come to God and how we walk as Christians.
Rom 6:11-14 Gal 2:20-21 Mark 7:5-9
The “law” and legalistic terms always speak to our “flesh”.
Grace is god acting in our life to reveal, by the Holy Spirit, spiritual truths in the Word of God.
Church Growth
How do churches grow? For many people, growth in numbers is “the” measure of success.
There are many ways churches grow and sometimes it may even be due to the working of the Holy Spirit.
A charismatic motivational leader can motivate high achievers in the congregation to be part of making a “successful” enterprise. It doesn’t matter how.
Most of the “Mega” churches in America have written books and have leadership programs for how they did it. Read the rest of this entry »
Why do Christians have so many attitudes?
Attitude testifies to a person’s view of Christianity as a spiritual experience from God or as a religion trying to come to God or please God on their own terms …..
Everyone should understand that there are a lot of counterfeit Christians and counterfeit Christian denominations out there.
There are some who practice a counterfeit religion because they have been deceived. There are also alot of charlatans whose purpose is to deceive. They get personal gratification from controlling others through religious deception. Some may even be well meaning, but they can’t stand to have people really understand their freedom in Christ, so they keep people in all kinds of religious bondage, and the people are willing because they don’t take responsibility for knowing the scriptures. Jeremiah 5:26-31
In order to be accepted or to belong to a group, some people will pretend that they have had the same experience which others claim that they have had. (Many denominational clergy and cult leaders are all to willing to allow this and to use these people to their advantage.)
Some people are discouraged in their faith when they do not experience God in the same way as others claim they do. They may fall away from a counterfeit religion and never come to understand that their faith should be based on their own relationship to God as revealed to them in scripture and not what someone else claims. There is a big difference between what God puts into our heart and what someone else puts into our mind.
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