How the Early Church Baptized - by Wyatt Graham

Found here. Our comments in bold.

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Wow. This clocks in at over 12,000 words. While we do appreciate the author's thoroughness, and also that he quotes a lot of Scripture (an all-to-rare thing among these supposed Bible teachers), he still operates according to traditional assumptions. And he assumes his tradition is correct, of course. 

But what if there is a different approach, one the author never considers? What if the practice of water baptism was supposed to fade out over time to be supplanted by Holy Spirit baptism? John the Baptist actually prophesied this:

Mt. 3:11 I baptize you with water for repentance. But after me will come one who is more powerful than I, whose sandals I am not fit to carry. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire.

Now, we ask the reader to bear with us. Let's see if we can refilter our understanding of everything the author writes through a new lens, that water baptism was to be replaced by Holy Spirit baptism. Read all the author's scriptural documentation, but try to understand it via this new paradigm. The reader will no doubt see that nearly every Scripture the author cites fits neatly into this.

In addition, we need to note that the author makes a very substantial omission, that neither Paul nor Jesus baptized:

Jn. 4:1-2 The Pharisees heard that Jesus was gaining and baptizing more disciples than John, 2 although in fact it was not Jesus who baptized, but his disciples.

1Co. 1:17 For Christ did not send me to baptize, but to preach the gospel...

If baptism was to be the standard practice of the Church, then why did both Jesus and Paul avoid baptizing?

Lastly, we will omit the post NT witnesses cited by the author. We are only interested in what the Bible itself teaches. We will insert comments as he proceeds.

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The Donkey Had More Discernment Than the Prophet - By Elizabeth Prata

Found here. Our comments in bold.
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Ms. Prata botches her explanation of Balaam because she has a predetermined narrative. She believes that OT prophets were morally pure and made no mistakes. So because Balaam was confronted by his donkey and the Angel of the Lord, Ms. Prata thinks he's a false prophet.

However, there is no evidence that Balaam was a false prophet. In fact, he precisely told King Balak's messengers what the Lord told him to say. 

We must deem this Bad Bible Teaching.

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Dominionism, Kingdom Now: NAR’s Heretical Eschatology - by Marsha West

Found here. Our comments in bold.

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This is a very frustrating article. It is a litany of charges, assertions, insinuations, and assumptions about a nebulous group of people who supposedly are intent on taking over the world. She warns us about a great danger of these Christians infiltrating various facets of society with the goal of Christianizing these institutions. But what that danger is, she doesn't say.

She does manage to provide a couple of quotes from supposed NAR people, but those quotes contain nothing nefarious, and don't speak to the subject of eschatology. We long for some sort of documentation that the NAR wants to take over the world. We would like at least some quotes from supposed NAR leaders that articulate these principles. 

Only about 400 words belong to the author, so it's really no wonder she doesn't document any of her claims. And there are no Bible verses quoted. We must deem this Bad Bible Teaching.

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New York Times accidentally proves Deep State is a 100% REAL evil supervillain... - Revolver News

Found here. Interesting insight into the entrenched bureaucracy.

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Way before people started calling it the “Deep State,” Washington had a built-in system that never changed no matter who won the White House. It is the permanent bureaucracy, entrenched military brass, intelligence chiefs, and federal powers that outlast presidents and shape outcomes.

And according to newly unsealed testimony, Richard Nixon didn’t just believe that machine existed. He walked straight into this buzz saw and was shredded.

The New York Times just published a very interesting piece divulging that while Nixon was drowning in Watergate hell, there was something else happening behind the scenes… something way more explosive and dangerous. It was a wartime espionage operation run by senior military officials inside the Pentagon. This was the actual Deep State running an operation against the President of The United States.

Die if you see God? - rethink

Recently we've been reconsidering many of the things we thought we understood regarding doctrine and faith. We have begun to question certain beliefs, church structures, and practices of the western church. Too often we have discovered unbiblical doctrines and activities. This causes us concern. We have deemed this our “rethink.”

Our questions include, how did we arrive at our doctrines? Does the Bible really teach what we think it teaches? Why do churches do what they do? What is the biblical basis of church leadership structure? Why do certain traditions get entrenched?

It's easy to be spoon fed the conventional wisdom, but it's an entirely separate thing to search these things out for one's self. In the past we have read the Bible with these unexamined understandings and interpreted what we read through those lenses. We were lazy about our Bible study, assuming that pastors and theologians were telling us the truth, but we rarely checked it out for ourselves.

Therefore, these Rethinks are our attempt to remedy the situation.

We should note that we are not Bible scholars, but we believe that one doesn't need to be in order to understand the Word of God.
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Is Predestination in the Bible? - By Daniel Nealon

Found here. Our comments in bold.
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The author is going to explain his Reformed/Calvinism. He's not going to explain the Bible. Calvinists never explain the Bible unless they can further expound on the wonders of Calvinism. This is what they do, over and over. 

Today it's Predestination, the idea that God pre-selected those whom He would save and those He would send to hell. Thus you have no choice. If God chose you, you're in. If He didn't, you're out. 

Which means nothing you do or say will change your destiny. If you're not among the elect, well, go live it up. But even if you are one of the elect (which you cannot know), you can do whatever you want. 

Predestination as believed by Calvinists is not a biblical doctrine.

In addition, the author barely manages to quote Scripture, and none of them or the Bible references he cites support his doctrine.

We must consider this Bad Bible Teaching.

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An Evaluation Of Wayne Grudem’s View Of NT Prophecy - By Steven Kring

Excerpted from here. Our comments in bold.
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The author is going to evaluate some other teacher's ideas. Though he quotes a good deal of Scripture, he's not going to teach the Bible, he's going to teach his cessationist doctrine. He make many of the standard cessationist arguments, but add little new light.

Which is a wasted opportunity, especially considering the article weighs in at a hefty 5200 words. Surely with such an opportunity the author might make some thorough biblical analysis, perhaps even having it evaluated by a hostile witness.

Then his arguments might have been a little better. Otherwise, this is just Bad Bible Teaching.

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Why 1 Timothy 2 Is A Universal Normative Guide - by Steven Wedgeworth

Found here. Our comments in bold.
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So many things irritate us regarding these people who are supposed to be Bible teachers. Today's author hits some of those buttons. 

This article clocks in at over 2100 words. But it's not 2100 words of explanation. Only a little more than 1400 words are actually the author's. 

Encumbering the text is information that properly belongs in the footnotes. On several occasions the author includes verbiage like "See Fee, 'Reflections on Church Order,' 146, 150–51." These insertions are awkward and break the flow of the thought. He does supply three actual footnotes, so he knows how to use them. There is no reason at all for this.

When we add these into the word count, we are now at 1900 words. 

In addition, the author quotes other Bible teachers and statements of faith. But only 21 words are from the Bible (from a single verse). Astonishingly, he never quotes the subject verse! 

We shall do so for the benefit of the reader:

1Ti. 2:12-13 I do not permit a woman to teach or to have authority over a man; she must be silent. 13 For Adam was formed first, then Eve.

Why are we counting words? Because we want to know what the author intends to teach so that we can evaluate his ideas, and we want to know where in the Bible these ideas are found. If he hides behind other people's work or unnecessary or undefined verbiage and doesn't explain or teach, he fails as a Bible teacher.

We will discover that the author gets a lot of things right about this verse, but right at the end he abandons all of his previous elucidation and without explanation simply jumps to the traditional viewpoint.

For the benefit of the reader, we will state our position, which has nothing to do with "complementarian" vs. "egalitarian." We believe that Paul wasn't discussing church order at all. He writes "a woman" not "women," and "a man" not "men." The Greek words are guné: a woman, wife, my lady, and anér: a male human being; a man, husband. So if Paul was actually talking about the marriage relationship and not church order, the subsequent appeal to Adam and Eve suddenly makes more sense.

Let's retranslate the verse:

1Ti. 2:12-13 I do not allow the wife to instruct the husband, neither to domineer over him; she is to be at rest and calm. 13 For Adam was formed first, then Eve.

We do not claim to be experts in the Greek, but we don't think that's necessary. Despite centuries of tradition, this small change fairly leaps out at us.

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Can AI Preach My Sermon? - By Caleb Phelps

Found here. Our comments in bold.
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A generally good and useful presentation, marred by the unbiblical elevation of pastor to the CEO leader, preacher, and teacher of the congregation. This of course is the traditional practice, but there is nothing in the Bible that tells us the pastor is the teacher.

AI should be treated as a tool. But the problem is people are lazy, incompetent, devious, and constantly looking for validation. AI is the shortcut to accolades and approval without expending the effort. 

If AI is generating your sermon, you need to find another line of work.

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Does the Holy Spirit Work Miracles Today? - By Daniel Nealon

Found here. Our comments in bold.
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This is simply Bad Bible Teaching. There's no other way to describe it. The author doesn't quote the Bible. At all. He misrepresents Bible verses. He lies to us about the Bible's contents. He incompetently teaches about things he clearly doesn't understand.

We don't wish to dishonor the man, but this is bad. 

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Christian, Look To and Learn From Older Saints - by Graham Heslo

Found here. A very good article. 

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This article addresses a fundamental deficit in our churches, the pressing need for true discipleship. That is, older, godly Christians one-on-one with younger, inexperienced Christians. 

But what churches typically offer is a Sunday service, a mid-week service, and small groups. These are not discipleship.

The result of our failure to disciple is that the sheep remain sheep all their lives. Nothing is demanded from them except their polite attendance on Sunday, and that their tithe check clears.

This should not be.

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