Author: fundyreformed

Tweeting the Gospel

~ fundyreformed ~ 1 Comment

Twitter is becoming more and more popular these days. One of the things it does is force us to be succinct, which is good. Nine Marks Ministries‘ blog, Church Matters, is challenging all Christian twitterers to share the gospel in 1 tweet. It’s a novel idea, and causes us to focus on the true heart of the gospel. Crafting such a tweet is a good exercise, but it also challenges us to use Twitter for good ends, by challenging those with whom we interact on Twitter, with the gospel.

I enjoyed crafting my tweet, but I would have loved more than 140 characters! Here’s my tweet, and then a better one.

G=S+J<M / Gospel=Sin [spurning God & His law] + Judgment [eternal punishment] < Mercy [Jesus died in our place offering peace with God] #9M

The #9M enters me in the contest, and can be searched easily via Twitter. Take some time to read through the results of that search, and you’ll encounter many other ways to simply declare the heart of the gospel.

My tweet stopped short of calling people to believe this message. But I think the Gospel, when understood, carries the weight of a response within the message itself. When one understands G=S+J<M, he may then value the truth in this message and cherish it. In short, he will come to believe it.

A much better attempt at distilling the beauty of the gospel in a few words was accomplished by songwriter Drew Jones:

Holy God, in love, became / Perfect Man to bear my blame / On the cross He took my sin / By His death I live again

These words form the entire length of The Gospel Song (music by Bob Kauflin). It is one of my favorite songs; learn more about it here.

So what’s your gospel tweet? Post it on twitter, or add it to the comments at the Church Matters’ blog (contest runs through Wednesday night). But please share your gospel tweet in the comments here. 140 comments or less. Let’s rejoice in the clarity of the gospel together.

Abortion… As Unthinkable as Racism

~ fundyreformed ~ 7 Comments
John Piper has some great remarks on the connection between racism and abortion. The link between the two gives hope that as the one used to be accepted and now is unthinkable, so the other will fade away as well.
clipped from www.desiringgod.org
We should seek to stigmatize abortion by associating it with racism as closely as the truth warrants.
People today don’t oppose the enslavement of blacks merely because they think it’s wrong.
It’s easy to oppose it because to do so is fashionable.

That’s a good thing. It always helps when the right thing happens to be P.C.

So let’s be wise in showing the way abortion is closer to racism and slavery than people see.
The Supreme Court in the Dred Scott case of 1857 held that black slaves were property without rights as persons, yet today we view that as unthinkable. So the Supreme Court in the case of Roe v. Wade (1973) held that the unborn did not have rights as persons, yet we should hope and work that the day may come when that too is viewed as unthinkable.
Between 1882 and 1968, 3,446 black people were lynched in America. Today more black babies are killed by white abortionists every three days than all who were lynched in those years (L.E.A.R.N.).
blog it

Announcing: Transformed by Grace

~ fundyreformed ~ 1 Comment

Some reforming fundamentalist friends of mine and I have got together and founded a new online social media site called Transformed by Grace. We are a community of former legalists and reforming fundamentalists, continually allowing God’s grace to bring us closer to Christ.

Using a free social media site provided by Ning.com, we have built a site that allows members, forums, groups, personal blog posts & pages, and lots of interaction. Think of it like a bigger Facebook group or a mini version of something like Sharper Iron. It actually has more capabilities than either Facebook or a typical forums site, and offers a lot of flexibility in how one can use it.

Our goal is to bring together other like minded reforming fundamentalists, particularly those who are familiar with the more conservative wing of Independent Baptist Fundamentalism. We hope to encourage one another, talk through remaining questions and problems, and forge relationships. And we hope to offer some help to those who are beginning their journey within fundamentalism. We want to help them learn and grow in a non-threatening environment. We don’t pressure anyone necessarily to follow a particular path out of fundamentalism, some of our founding members are happy within the IFB tent. We hope to challenge each other and grow in grace.

So, please go over and check out our site: http://reformedfundamentalism.ning.com.

Feel free to join the group or just lurk for a while. Bookmark us and come back in a few months, as I’m sure there will be more activity by then. If you have a blog that’s somewhat devoted to these issues, feel free to let us know and we’ll add it to the blogroll and possibly send some visitors your way. Above all, let us know if there’s something we can help you with. That’s what we are hoping to accomplish.

Announcing: A New & Improved King James Only Blog

~ fundyreformed ~ 19 Comments

Over the years I’ve toiled alone in trying to create a good KJV Only resource site. There are others out there, and I mainly wanted to publicize them. I also have an interest in the debate and have posted from time to time on the topic here. I’ve had my fair share of blog wars and debates over this too. Other obligations and interests have left that site only partially complete, however.

I’ve finally enlisted a couple likeminded blogging buddies, Phil and Damien, who are going to help me maintain an active KJV Only Blog where we’ll try to compile a bunch of blog posts relating to this debate. Discussions will be saved in the comments and it may prove to be a helpful resource for many.

Our first substantive post went up today, so I encourage you to check out King James Only?, and click on the subscribe links. We’ll be doing some re-posting over there of material the 3 of us have posted at our own blogs, and we will create new content as well. We want it to be a clearing house of good resources on the debate from an informed, rational perspective. One that doesn’t paint all King James Onlyists as total wack0s since all of us posters are former KJV Onlyists ourselves. We feel the debate is important, and that providing patient helpful answers is a good thing for those seeking their way in the debate at large.

Let me know what you think, and if anyone would like to join our effort, contact me.