GES’ Bob Wilkin: A Heretic’s Vagaries and Intrigue. - Comments (6)

Category: Articles,Doctrine,GES: Hodges, Wilkin, et.al.
Author: John Malone
Date: 2nd August, 2007 @ 12:27:34 AM

Friday night, as promised, I attended the “Regional Conference” of the Grace Evangelical Society (GES) hosted by Community Bible Church (CBC) in Omaha, a church my family and I formerly attended in Omaha. I was among the 100 or less in attendance, and so were a half dozen of my friends. Perhaps 20% of the attendees were from the host church.

I went to this conference to expose Bob Wilkin. It’s one thing to teach what he does. It’s a whole different thing to disguise it, slip it in, and be guileful about it. And it’s even another thing to do it here where I live, among people I know.

As George, the former temporary head coach in Hoosiers told Head Coach Norman Dale, “Look, mister, there’s two kinds of dumb. A guy that gets naked and runs out in the snow and barks at the moon, and, a guy who does the same thing in my living room. First one don’t matter. The second one you’re kinda forced to deal with.”
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A Protestant in the Midst of Apostasy. - Comments (4)

Category: Articles,Doctrine,Roman Catholicism
Author: John Malone
Date: 25th July, 2007 @ 02:38:48 AM

Peter Smagacz is 58 years old and glad to have left the Roman Catholic Church. He left it 35 years ago.

I read an article sent to me that was published on Omaha’s daily newspaper, the Omaha World Herald, that described Smagacz’ one-man “protest” at a Luis Palau “Heartland Festival” in Omaha. The event was said to have attracted 105,000 visitors, a record. I suppose, hyperbole being what it is, the crowd was likely half that size, but still large.

Palau is known among Bible believers to be “soft on Romanism,” and far too ecumenical to be Biblically sound. Many of us consider that ministries like Palau’s yoke themselves with unbelievers, contrary to Bible principles set forth in 2 Corinthians 6:14, and Revelation 18:4. The more skeptical among us – call us jaded – know that men like Palau don’t become prominent in this country without somehow accepting that Roman Catholics are essentially Christian.

Otherwise, Romanists would have destroyed him by now.
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Lent. No Thanks. - Comments (39)

Category: Applied,Articles,Roman Catholicism
Author: John Malone
Date: 24th March, 2007 @ 05:56:29 AM

One of the practices I left behind when I received Christ as Savior 32 years ago was the keeping of the “Lenten season.”

The wholesale adoption of this Roman Catholic version of ancient pagan practice by what was once Protestantism is indicative of the departure that marks our day.

Now let me be clear here: I have no qualm with anyone’s religious practice, within civil bounds. If someone wants to re-enact the weeping for Tammuz, or some other pagan practice, I consider them free to do so.

My issue with “Lent” is the Christianizing of it: the attempt by ignorant or dishonest men to sell the practice to the unsuspecting as if it had to do with faith in Jesus Christ.
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Working Out Loud. - Comments (0)

Category: Articles,Doctrine
Author: John Malone
Date: 3rd March, 2007 @ 06:02:25 AM

The secular life is marked by compartmentalization.

One has his “spiritual life.” His “business life.” His “family life.” His “financial life.” His “private life.” His “personal life.” His “professional life.” Perhaps this carries on ad inifinitum.”

I’m reminded of a popular humorous television seires which once featured a character whose life was so dichotomous, he claimed: “You see, right now, I have Relationship George, but there is also Independent George. That’s the George you know, the George you grew up with — Movie George, Coffee shop George, Liar George, Bawdy George.”

“If ‘Relationship George’ walks through this door, he will kill ‘Independent George.’ A George divided against itself cannot stand.”

While the humor in those remarks is rib-tickling, it is so because that is so much of the way we live our lives, masking our private person with a publc persona that is framed to favorably impact whoever we are attempting to impress.

The spiritual life, marked in the Bible, has no such distinctions of persona, no such compartmentalization, no such vanities of impression. God’s exemplary servant, the chief or protos sinner … the pattern or hupo-tupos for the rest of us, for the rest of this dispensation.
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Disagreeing to Agree. - Comments (3)

Category: Applied,Articles,Roman Catholicism
Author: John Malone
Date: 24th February, 2007 @ 11:11:27 AM

Recently, I received a reply to some Scriptural exegesis that read:

I refuse to argue with you, John.

As far as I am concerned, I have the one true religion and you can try to convince me all you want and I will not falter in my own belief, just as you apparently will not falter in your own.

Here is where I believe as mature Christians we will disagree.

So no arguing please.

Obviously, this itself is an argument – one frequently used – which has as its aim to stop a discourse, in this case specifically, my discourse to a small, but heavily Roman Catholic audience.

Here’s the short version: Stop writing.

I’m obliged to answer, in this case.
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Why People End Up In the Lake of Fire. - Comments (10)

Category: Articles,Doctrine
Author: John Malone
Date: 17th February, 2007 @ 01:46:42 PM

Recently I experienced an exchange – about the way of salvation – get terminated by the pithy phrase “God loves all of us,” and “Can’t we agree to disagree.”

On the first count, God does NOT love all of us. I know that’s not cool to say, and seems to fly in the face of John 3:16, but hold your horses. we have to cut straight the Scriptures. The Bible says God “hated” Esau.

On the second count, I just despise the statement. It smacks of complete insincerity. What it really means is this: “We disagree, let’s drop the subject.” If all disgreements resulted in dropping the subject, nearly no agreements would ever happen.

Disagreement – whether in agreeable or disagreeable form – is not an optin for believers. The Apostle wrote to the Corintians, and stipulated they be in agreement, not only in mind, but in judgment.

God is not mockable. He cannot be worked. He punishes rebellion and disobedience. Those who quote John 3:16 as a proof text should read a few verses onward.

Sometime when watching a football game, I would like to see the sign read John 3:15-21 instead of 3:16. It would still fit on the screen, and I could still see if the field goal was good or not.

Maybe someone would even dare to put up John 3:36!
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Can My Infant Child Be Saved? - Comments (19)

Category: Articles,Doctrine
Author: John Malone
Date: 15th February, 2007 @ 09:29:59 AM

Some friends of mine have a tiny baby in critical condition. The thoughts of loved ones around them have gone to the eternal status of the child.

It’s interesting to me that many people wonder about the state of the child, but often overlook their own state!

But I though perhaps the consideration arises in the minds of many Christians, “Can this child be saved?”
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