Happy New Year!

It's a new year! Last year I read through the entire Bible. This year I want to try something different. Going to slow down and read for quality and not blast through entire chapters.

I'm starting with Galatians, and today it's verses 1-10 of chapter one. In it Paul is talking about the people running to "another gospel", most likely one of works instead of the gospel of Jesus Christ. He condemns this alternative gospel, and states that's he's trying to please God, not people.

The same problems occur today. We've heard of the "prosperity gospel" where people will claim that Jesus wants you to be rich, you just have to claim certain verses. Or that you have to "work" for your salvation. Bullocks!

Still Around

Still around,  working some small projects,  including my read the bible in a year,  which I'm almost done!  Will get back to regular posting soon.

52 Words Every Christian Should Know cont...

36. Regeneration – Regeneration or being born again refers to God's act of making a person alive spiritually. This is the supernatural work of the Holy Spirit by which sinners are given new spiritual life enabling them to relate to God in faith, love, obedience, and delight.

37. Justification – Justification is God's judicial declaration that a sinner who believes in Christ is counted righteous instead of guilty, based on Jesus' death on his or her behalf. Christ's righteousness is imputed (reckoned) to the sinner just as God imputed sin to Christ on the cross.

52 Words Every Christian Should Know cont...

34. Gospel – Gospel literally means “good news.” “Gospel” refers in Scripture mainly to the message that through the life, death, and resurrection of Christ, God graciously acted to establish His kingdom and now welcomes into His family sinners who repent and receive Christ by faith.

35. Predestination – Predestination means that God has marked out ahead of time or predetermined certain things that shall come to pass. In particular, God has marked out certain persons for salvation or service. Such individuals are called in Scripture the elect or chosen.

Last Hot Day of the Year?

Today is supposed to be the hottest day of the week, and FINALLY relief arrives  in the form of cooler temps! Looking forward to turning off the A/C for the season.

52 Words Every Christian Should Know cont...

32. Atonement – Atonement refers to reconciling alienated parties by making amends, that is, by fully satisfying the penalty so that the offense is removed and the relationship is restored. In Scripture, Christ's death provided atonement in that He died as a substitute for sinners.

33. Resurrection – The resurrection of Jesus means His rising from the dead on the third day after His crucifixion, in bodily form, transformed so that His body can never die again. Evidence for His resurrection focuses on the empty tomb and the appearances of the living Christ.

52 Words Every Christian Should Know cont...

29. Messiah - “Messiah” is the English spelling of a Hebrew (Old Testament) term meaning “anointed one.” This title refers to the One promised by the prophets. In Greek (New testament), the same term is “Christ.” Early Christians turned “Christ” into a name for Jesus.

30. Kingdom of God – The kingdom of God is His rule through His messianic King. According to Jesus' teaching, the kingdom was both present and future. All who believe in and follow Him are already in the kingdom, yet the kingdom will be gloriously revealed at the return of Christ.

31. Son of Man – A phrase occurring in both Testaments, “Son of Man” was Jesus' favorite title for Himself. In the Old Testament it usually meant “human being,” but in Daniel 7 He was a mysterious messianic figure. Jesus used this title as an alternative to calling Himself the Messiah.

52 Words Every Christian Should Know cont...

26. Hell – Hell is the final place and condition of unregenerate humans (and evil spirits) in which they consciously suffer everlasting punishment, separated from God forever. It is a place of spiritual, psychological, and bodily torment from which there will never be hope of release.

27. Son of God - “Son of God” means more than that Jesus was diving or a special messenger sent from God to the world. “Son of God” means that Jesus is fully God Himself, equal in power and glory to God the Father and God the Spirit.

28. Virgin Birth – Mary, the mother of Jesus, was sexually chaste both when she conceived Him and when He was born. The Holy Spirit “overshadowed” Mary, bringing about her pregnancy.

52 Words Every Christian Should Know cont...

23. The Devil – A supernatural spirit creature hostile to God. He leads a host of other spirit beings in opposing God by tempting, accusing, leading astray, and other means. He is not equal to God and does not threaten God's sovereignty or power.

24. Demons – A demon is any of the wicked spirit creatures, without physical bodies, opposed to God. They are also called unclean spirits, evil spirits, and angels who sinned (therefore, fallen angels). There is only one devil, but there are multitudes of demons.

25. Antichrist – The Greek antichristos means “against Christ” or “instead of Christ,” and therefore refers to an enemy of Christ or one who attempts to usurp His position. Although the term is found only in John's epistles, the concept is found in a number of passages.

Linux - Back to Kubuntu

For the last five to six months, my main desktop was running OpenSUSE 13.2, and overall I liked it. Over the past couple of months I notice that each time the kernel was updated, I had to manually go in and recompile the video drivers for my NVIDIA video card. At most it took about 5 minutes, so I wasn't all that bothered by it. However one day two weeks ago I got the usual command line prompt after a kernel upgrade. But this time the usual manual recompile trick didn't work. After working on it for a day, I decided to jump ship and try another distro. I'm a big fan of KDE, so I went with Kubuntu 15.04 first, which features the new Plasma 5 desktop. I really like the layout, but at this time there is no icon in the system tray for Dropbox, so you don't know if Dropbox is working or not. I played around with several other distros, until I finally settled on Kubuntu 14.04, with is a LTS (Long Term Support) release. It still features KDE4, and the Dropbox icon works perfectly. I came to the conclusion that stability and familiarity is more important for me on my main desktop then the latest bells and whistles. In comparison, OpenSUSE 13.2 is running on my Dell Vostro 1500 notebook, and I've yet to have a problem with it.

52 Words Every Christian Should Know cont.

20. Sabbath – (Hebrew Shabbat) means rest. It refers in particular to resting on the seventh day of the week in obedience to the fourth of the Ten Commandments.

21. Original Sin – When Adam and Eve disobeyed God in the garden of Eden in the fall, their nature was damaged or distorted, and their descendants (all humans after them) have been born in a sinful condition.

22. Depravity – Depravity means tendency toward evil. Everyone is naturally inclined away from loving God, and toward self-centeredness. Humans are not as sinful as they can possibly be, but the are tainted by evil through and though.

52 Words Every Christian Should Know Cont.

18. Covenants – A covenant (berith in Hebrew) is a binding agreement between two parties. The scriptural focus is on covenants initiated by God, for which He provided visible signs and for which He sometimes attached stipulations or conditions.

19. Circumcision – Physical circumcision refers to the act of cutting off the foreskin of a male's reproductive organ. Spiritual circumcision refers to the inner change by which a person is enabled to trust, love, and obey God wholeheartedly.

52 Words Every Christian Should Know Cont.

16. Miracles – A miracle is a powerful intervention worked by God or some other supernatural agent in which ordinary operations (the laws of nature) are displaced, often serving as public signs authenticating the human agent through whom the miracle is performed.

17. Marriage – A God-given institution, is a legally recognized relationship, made formal by a civil or religious ceremony, between one man and one woman, who commit to live together in maintaining a home, to share sexual intimacy, and (usually) to bear and rear children.

52 Words Every Christian Should Know Cont.

13. Great Commandments – The Great commandments are Jesus' summary of the religious and moral message of the Scriptures of His day, and the New Testament shows their expanded application. Christians live by these two overarching principles not only in this life, but also for eternity.

14. Image of God – Human beings resemble God in that they have personality, morality, and spirituality; further, thy represent God as His agent to the animals and the rest of creation. Although sin has marred the imaged of God in everyone except Christ, the image is not destroyed.

15. Angels – An angel is one of the multitudes of personal supernatural spirit beings that God made. All angels were created good, but some fell into evil. In English, “angel” is derived directly from the Greek angelos, meaning “messenger,” one function of certain good angels.

Relief from the Heat!

Some relief from the heat today, it's only in the 60s at lunchtime! Going to get hotter this weekend, but I'll take this temporary break from the heat.

No 100 Degree days yet in Oklahoma City!

June 23, and Oklahoma City has not reached 100 degrees yet! Of course it's pretty humid outside because of all the rain, but at least we have not hit the century mark yet. Will we get through this summer staying in the 90's?

52 Words Every Christian Should Know (Continued)

11. Prophecy – Prophets were spokesmen for God, with a message inspired by His Spirit that often included predictions about near and remote events. Their prophecies, given orally at first, were often written down and included in the Scriptures.

12. Interpretation – To interpret a passage of Scripture is to explain its message: first as it was meant to be understood in its original setting; and second as it was significance in a contemporary setting. Christ is the central theme of Scripture, and the Spirit guides persons to right interpretation.

52 Words Every Christian Should Know (Continued)

9. Infallibility – The infallibility of the Bible means that it is perfectly true and that it accomplished the purpose the diving Author intended each of its parts to achieve.

10. The Law – Although the five books of Moses – and the Old Testament as a whole – may be call the Law, in essence “law” refers to all the righteous demands of God that reveal His hold commandments for His people, including moral, religious, and civil obligations.

52 Words Every Christian Should Know (Continued)

7. Trinity – God is eternally one Being. Yet He exists eternally as three Persons, the Father, the Son, and the Spirit. There are not three Gods, only one. The Father, the Son, and the Spirit are distinct from each other.

8. Inspiration – Biblical inspiration refers to the work of the Holy Spirit by which He produced the words of the entire Bible, using the personality and literary skill of its human authors, so that the resultant written text is God's authoritative Word to mankind.

52 Words Every Christian Should Know (Continued)

5. Presence – God's presence is His “being there.” Omnipresence means that He is everywhere at all times. There is no place or time God is not. Yet the biblical emphasis is on His manifested presence, experienced only at certain times and places and by specific persons.

6. Love – God's love is His freely given, intense affection, actively showing delight and goodwill toward the objects of His pleasure. Grace is His love expressed to those who don't deserve it; mercy is His love shown to those in need.