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Talk:Essay:The Coming Fifth Great Awakening in America (view source)
Revision as of 21:46, April 1, 2009
, 21:46, April 1, 2009→Winning and losing lifestyles: new section
:Thanks! Great quote, I'll see if I can work it in somewhere. [[User:AddisonDM|AddisonDM]] 09:27, 29 March 2009 (EDT)
:Thanks! Great quote, I'll see if I can work it in somewhere. [[User:AddisonDM|AddisonDM]] 09:27, 29 March 2009 (EDT)
== Winning and losing lifestyles ==
I will concentrate here on what sort of preaching I believe would work best:
The secular lifestyle, with its debauchery, is a ''losing'' proposition, and a ''loser's'' proposition.
The Gospel proposes a ''winning'' method for life.
Consider: What does [[sin]] mean? From the article ([[Sin (Fundamentalism)]]) that I wrote: sin is a ''missing of the mark.'' It involves more than those who deliberately shoot wide of the mark, or who think that they can set up their own mark and ignore the Mark that [[God]] set for us. It also involves those who just can't see the mark (perhaps because they're playing pin-the-tail-on-the-[[donkey]] in the classic manner, i.e. blindfolded) and ''also'' those who think they can hit the mark on their own. And as it turns out, no one can.
So we must put it this way:
Would you like to hit the mark? I mean ''really'' hit it? Or at least try to scare it a little? Because the closer you get to the mark, the better off you'll be, where it counts.
And what counts most of all is this: God knows where you are. He came to this earth to feel what you feel, and to take all the booby prizes for everyone, past, present, and future, who tried for that mark and missed. What other religious tradition even speaks in those terms? [[Islam]] makes you walk a tightrope over a burning canyon. (Unless you kill somebody to advance the faith, but that's a little out of the league of most of those who will hear our message.) [[Judaism]] is, by definition, incomplete: it is still under the law, though the age of the law is past, and that of grace has succeeded.
In closing, however, I have to mention one other possibility: we are likely to get snatched (Greek ''harpagesometha'', from ''harpazo'' I seixe, snatch, and carry off by force) ({{Bible ref|book=1_Thessalonians|chap=4|verses=16-18}}) before this mission even gets out of the planning stage. Everything depends on whether Divine patience is finally exhausted. As it might very well be.--[[User:TerryH|TerryH]]<sup>[[User talk:TerryH|Talk]]</sup> 17:46, 1 April 2009 (EDT)