“We have to show mercy because we are so screwed up!” Steve Brown
Mercy
05 Friday Jul 2019
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in≈ Comments Off on Mercy
05 Friday Jul 2019
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in≈ Comments Off on Mercy
“We have to show mercy because we are so screwed up!” Steve Brown
18 Sunday Nov 2018
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in≈ Comments Off on How Can you Beat this!
I just saw a digitally captured tap dancing ghost (compliments of the show Ghost Adventures)…how can you beat that!!!!
The Dirk
24 Sunday Jun 2018
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in≈ Comments Off on My Favorite Topic…Grace
Steve Brown, one of the greatest proponents of grace, wrote:
I’m often asked, “Okay, I get this grace thing, but where do you draw the line?”
My standard answer is that you don’t; and when you do, it’s no longer grace. Grace covers white lies, murder and porn. It’s an umbrella that invites gays, lesbians, adulterers, liars and thieves. It’s for the pretenders of goodness and obedience. It covers the arrogant, the fat, the angry and the failures. It’s for everybody who is unqualified.
The drawing of the line is more often than not an effort to attain power, manipulate, affirm one’s own righteousness and keep out the spiritual cretins from the “family.” Drawing a line is the stuff of which religious institutions are made. I find myself getting quite irritated when people do that…
There is (and you know it’s true) a mushy kind of grace sort of like what…attributes to political liberalism. It’s a ‘let’s join hands and sing Kumbaya around the campfire. You’re okay and I’m okay…so just keep singing because the singing is the important thing.'”
Now from Dirk: That “mushy” kind of grace is not part of the grace of the Gospel of Jesus Christ…that is heretical sentimentalism, not the grace that is from and founded in and exclusively kept by Jesus Christ and testified to by the Holy Spirit!
Grace to you, dirk
02 Monday Apr 2018
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in≈ Comments Off on Lost Wisdom
23 Friday Mar 2018
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in≈ Comments Off on Wisdom
“In religion, as in war and everything else, comfort is the one thing you cannot get by looking for it. If you look for truth, you may find comfort in the end: if you look for comfort you will not get either comfort or truth–only soft soap and wishful thinking to begin with and, in the end, despair. Most of us have got over the pre-war wishful thinking about international politics. It is time we did the same thing about religion.”
C. S. Lewis – Mere Christianity
26 Monday Feb 2018
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in≈ Comments Off on Heaven…
The oldest member had metastasized cancer and died only days later. He was known for throwing odd ball questions, but that day the questions revealed the immediacy of his imminent transition.
First, he asked if I thought all dogs would go to heaven and to then support my position. I never saw the movie, so I felt at a loss. I fumbled through some answer on the new heavens and new earth possibly including dogs. He sighed and said that he really loved his dog and would like to be companions for eternity (There was, by the way,no mention of his wife).
After several other questioners taken their turns, he asked what would we do in heaven. I responded somewhat assuredly that we would praise God. Again, rather deflated, he said that eternity is a long time just to do that, “I mean, will we read, you know, novels, etc..?”
I looked at him and could only respond, “I do not know.”
His questions surfaced today. I realized that this man (and myself) have a diminished view of the glory of God. The glory of the Triune God is so intense and limitless and deep and multi-faceted that even eternity will not contain all to be praised and discovered. We think that twenty minutes (depending on your denominational background!) of hymns, psalms, and spiritual song just about wraps praise time.
In heaven, if the God of the Bible is real, He will enrapture each of us with an unending sense of awe supplanting and surpassing anything, simply with His unveiled presence.
That is the answer: Our excitement and desire to praise Him will never be exhausted, routine, or boring. It cannot be.
Blessings, The Dirk
21 Tuesday Nov 2017
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in≈ Comments Off on The Luther Speaks
“So when the devil throws your sins in your face and declares that you deserve death and hell, tell him this: “I admit that I deserve death and hell, what of it? For I know One who suffered and made satisfaction on my behalf. His name is Jesus Christ, Son of God, and where He is there I shall be also!” ― Martin Luther
There is therefore now no condemnation for those in Christ Jesus…my only hope and foundation.
20 Monday Nov 2017
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in≈ Comments Off on 31 years
31 years ago the Lord Jesus Christ saved me and saved my marriage. I am trusting that milestone now…
The Dirk
calon wedi torri
24 Friday Feb 2017
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in≈ Comments Off on Social Commentary
The Dirk had a car breakdown yesterday (my sons will recall many of of those!). I was stranded for several hours in a high traffic area, next to a McDonald’s during the middle of the day. The only people to offer help and the help I received was from women. I would like to say that the Dirk’s good looks and charm moved these women just to talk to me. The fact is that I am so NOT threatening. Not one man asked or offered to help me in almost three hours. The young mother who helped went home to get jumper cables and came back. She was a recent resident of the area from Granbury, Texas (how ’bout that, Huldrich?). She wanted to make sure her son knew that helping people is the “right thang” to do.
I thank God for the ladies who stopped and especially the sweet Texas gal that helped!
The car still is doesn’t work…sigh.
The Dirk
19 Sunday Feb 2017
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in≈ Comments Off on The Rhythm of the Rain
When does two plus two equal nothing? By the way, I am not soliciting answers…it is a rhetorical question.
The Dirk