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Prayer causes things to happen that wouldn’t happen if you didn’t pray. God has ordained that prayer is a significant means by which he accomplishes his purposes in the world.
— John Piper, Desiring God
The prayer of a righteous person has great power as it is working. [James 5:16]
The only kind of sin that does not lead to death is the sin that we confess, repent of, and resolve to fight by God’s grace.
" The sin that does not lead to death and damnation is any sin that we commit that, by God’s grace, we are capable of truly confessing and repenting from.
“If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness” (1 John 1:9). First John 1:9 is a very, very precious promise. "
How might we as parents teach our daughters, even at young ages, how to express their femininity without flaunting their body?
John Piper really can't help himself. He never questions what makes nail polish organically feminine.
Now, back to the question about the little girl who wants to paint her nails. This brings up the issue — and it’s such a relevant issue — of male and female sexuality and what they are. What’s the difference between male and female? Twenty years ago, we might have felt like we didn’t need to talk about that. Everybody knew what that is. Well, now we need to be alert to the fact that our little girl should grow up with a happy, thoughtful awareness that God made her a girl and not a boy. And our son should grow up with a happy, thoughtful awareness that God made him a boy and not a girl.
So I will unashamedly say we should be happy when our daughter at 2 years old wants to paint her nails, and our son does not want to paint his nails. We should affirm her inclination toward this expression of femininity, and we should discourage our son’s dabbling in this expression of femininity (and there are sensitive ways to do that). And I use the term “expression of femininity” because I’m fully aware that nail polish is a cultural expression, not an innate one. It’s not in her genes that nail polish has to be on her fingernails. Girls aren’t born with painted nails.
But what is innate, God-given innate, is that healthy boys moving toward mature manhood are inclined by God-given nature to embrace culturally appropriate expressions of manhood. And we should help them with this. And healthy girls moving toward mature womanhood are inclined by God-given nature to embrace culturally appropriate expressions of womanhood. And I believe Paul teaches that very thing in 1 Corinthians 11:14. “Does not nature itself teach you?” he says. And he teaches the same in Romans 1, where he says people are acting against nature (Romans 1:21–28).
So I would be thankful that my daughter wants to paint her nails. And I would, along with my wife, train her up in how innocent and utterly insignificant nail polish is to her worth as a person and her influence in the world. We want her to have a worldview such that even if her fingers are all cut off in a machine accident, she would know she can be a beautiful, worthwhile, fruitful person as a believer in Jesus Christ and as the daughter of the King of the universe.
She was untouched, a white dove to the sinful acts of lust, the embodiment of an Angel sent from the heavens, and I want…, no I need her. I need to feel her silky skin on my hands, carnally embracing her warmth, I crave for her lips upon mine, her sweet voice calling my name as I worship her every being. She will be mine to posses as I wish, and I will do so without hesitance, taking pleasure in her ruination.
-k❤️ (2023)
Sir Richard Baker, who was unjustly imprisoned in England in the seventeenth century, wrote,
"But how is this true, when God oftentimes withholds riches and honors and health of body from men, though they walk never so uprightly? We may therefore know that honors and riches and bodily strength are none of God’s good things; they are of the number of things indifferent which God bestows promiscuously upon the just and unjust, as the rain to fall and the sun to shine.
The good things of God are chiefly peace of conscience and joy in the Holy Ghost in this life; fruition of God’s presence, and vision of his blessed face in the next, and these good things God never bestows upon the wicked, never withholds from the godly."
The truly good things of God are bestowed on those he loves. His presence. His peace. Joy in the Spirit. The assurance of heaven and beholding his face. Nothing can take away these good things of God. They are independent of circumstances and often grow stronger in trials. Adversity may be one of God’s best gifts because it makes us grab hold of God, desperate for his presence and peace. We cling to him more tightly when there is nothing else to cling to.
You may think you need to save your life in order to do your ministry. On the contrary, how you lose your life may be the capstone of your m
A Response to Jon Bloom’s “Can I Follow My New Heart?”
By Biblical Researcher, Psychologist, & Award-Winning Author, Eli Kittim
In an article entitled “Can I Follow My New Heart?” (published July 1, 2021), which was posted on John Piper’s desiringGod website, Jon Bloom, staff writer of https://www.desiringgod.org/ writes:
Find your joy in God with sermons, books, podcasts, video, and daily articles from the ministry of John Piper.
When Christians are born again, we enter
into a lifelong internal war where ‘the
desires of the flesh are against the Spirit,
and the desires of the Spirit are against the
flesh, for these are opposed to each other,
to keep you from doing the things you want
to do’ (Galatians 5:17).
That is incorrect, inaccurate, and misleading. When Paul talks about the war within, between the flesh and the Spirit, he is referring to a *pre-regenerative* rather than a “post-regenerative” state of mind. This battle or war between the flesh and the Spirit is waged BEFORE “Christians are born again,” NOT after! After “Christians are born again” this battle ENDS! The War within ends, provided an *authentic-regeneration* has taken place (not simply a fake “rebirth” based on a profession of faith or an altar call) in which we have died to our selves in order to receive a new identity (Ephesians 4:22-24). There is no more internal struggle. Sin no longer reigns within. God is now on the throne of your heart and, instead of war, there is peace. Instead of bitterness and anger there is love and self-acceptance. Sin has not been completely eradicated. It’s still there. But it no longer dominates your mind and heart. So, the notion that we enter a battle or a war AFTER we are reborn is completely false. On the contrary, that’s when the battle, in a certain sense, ends for us and tranquility ensues.
Jon Bloom misinterprets both the authorial intent of the Biblical authors as well as the concept of authentic rebirth. He mistakenly employs certain Biblical quotes to suggest that they are referring to a condition AFTER rebirth, when in fact they are referring to a carnal mind PRIOR to regeneration. Thus, he misreads the following verses out-of-context:
their ‘passions are at war within’ them
(James 4:1). Peter warns his readers (and
us), ‘Do not be conformed to the passions
of your former ignorance’ (1 Peter 1:14).
Paul describes this internal experience of
warring passions as ‘wretched’ (Romans
7:24).
Finally, the fact that he’s been totally misreading and distorting the Biblical authors becomes apparent. He writes:
And he [Paul] admonishes the Colossian
Christians (and us) with strong language:
‘Put to death therefore what is earthly in
you: sexual immorality, impurity, passion,
evil desire, and covetousness, which is
idolatry’ (Colossians 3:5). Why did these
apostles feel the need to speak this way to
regenerated people? Because the hearts of
these regenerated people were not yet fully
free from the influence of their flesh, their
old selves.
Why would Paul say “put to death” all these vices to regenerated Christians who have already done just that and have died to sin? And if reborn, recreated Christians are “not yet fully free from the influence of their flesh” (i.e. “their old selves”), then that implies that Christ either lied or was confused when he said “you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free” (John 8:32 NIV). No! It is Jon Bloom himself who is confused because in spite of what he writes, he nevertheless seems to acknowledge that after rebirth sin no longer dominates. He writes:
Paul lays the theological foundation of our
understanding by explaining ‘that our old
self was crucified with [Christ] in order that
[our] body of sin might be brought to
nothing, so that we would no longer be
enslaved to sin’ (Romans 6:6). Our new
selves were ‘raised with Christ’ (Colossians
3:1) so that ‘we too might walk in newness
of life’ (Romans 6:4). Therefore, we ‘must
consider [ourselves] dead to sin and alive to
God in Christ Jesus’ (Romans 6:11).
In sharp contrast to Jon Bloom’s overall message, Paul declares a radical change that has ALREADY occurred in the personality as a result of the *NEW BIRTH,* as well as a new way of being that is no longer dominated by sin or the carnal mind (Romans 8:1-2 ESV):
There is therefore now no condemnation for
those who are in Christ Jesus. For the law of
the Spirit of life has set you free in Christ
Jesus from the law of sin and death.
I therefore take issue with the notion of *regeneration* as an “internal war” between the flesh and the Spirit in which we “are not yet fully free.”
For a comparative reading, see the undermentioned link:
“Can I Follow My New Heart?” (Article by Jon Bloom, Staff writer, desiringGod website): https://www.desiringgod.org/articles/can-i-follow-my-new-heart?fbclid=IwAR0SjG4T6TVZN8TVuB0Sjt-10zS5UnRy05rxjPd00YiVWcixmVCR6dm3EW0
When facing difficult circumstances or decisions, should Christians just follow our hearts? The Bible’s answer may be more complicated than
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Christianity is not a crusade against anything. It is a mission to save sinners, and restore the moral beauty of the bride of Christ — a mission pursued by the cross of Christ, through the power of the Spirit, for the glory of God. Opposing sin is never an end in itself. Christian denunciation of sin is for the sake of holy jubilation in the presence of God.
John Piper, "A Peculiar Disapproval of Gay Pride"
