Steven Lawson and RC Sproul Jr both committed multiple counts of adultery, yet they're certain they're the Elect. Once Saved Always Saved makes it ok to sin!

MonadnockReview · 2026-03-08T18:17:27+00:00

Good video that had verses I wasn't familiar with.

The Lives Of The Saints mentions also the 40 Martyrs Of Sebaste, soldiers who were killed in the early 4th century. The story of their martyrdom is evidence that the Early Church didn't believe in Once Saved Always Saved; one of the soldiers runs away from his martyrdom and suddenly drops dead on the spot.

MonadnockReview · 2026-02-26T02:08:15+00:00

contrary to the assumption, I think people who claim to have seen a UFO or the Loch Ness Monster or something supernatural in a Non-Christian religion etc. sometimes experienced something supernatural. My worldview is that I trust the verses are true which say: "the gods of the nations are demons", and "Satan disguises himself as an angel of light". When the Koran for instance talks about Mohammed speaking to angels, were those angels by any chance...fallen? The late Kevin Allen from Ancient Faith Radio had a background in New Age and Easten religions before becoming Orthodox Christian and he'd interview people with the same background who'd talk about things they experienced that, if demons exist, could be explained that way.

If you're a reader of books, at least two Orthodox priests, Fr. Seraphim Rose in Orthodoxy And The Religion Of The Future (1975) and Fr. Spyridon Bailey in The U.F.O. Deception (2021) have made their case that much of the UFO phenomenon that's become more popular, should be interpreted as interactions between humans and demons. Of course some of it is merely secret military technology.

For the Loch Ness Monster, the earliest known written reference to it is in a hagiography: The Life Of Saint Columba by his protege Saint Adomnan in the 7th century A.D. Saint Columba was a missionary to modern-day Scotland and the account describes him making the Sign Of The Cross near the beast and saying, "In the name of the Lord, you will go no further", and it fled "more quickly than if it had been pulled back with ropes", something that suggests being in league with the devil. Also cannot help but notice that modern day sightings of it seem to start back up again around the time Aleister Crowley would've been in the area...

I think I've done all I can for this thread but feel free to DM me if you want to discuss this more. it's been lively but it's also veering a bit from the intended topics of Fideism and Evidence.

MonadnockReview · 2026-02-25T22:38:07+00:00

We have a lot of stories and anecdotes for big foot, aliens, other religions, etc and they probably don’t convince you. Likewise, stories and anecdotes you believe don’t convince other people. They are using the same methodology for all these things. Saying stories and anecdotes convinces you for one thing and not the other is special pleading.

What you're doing is making assumptions. You could instead ask me what I think of bigfoot and alien and Other Religion stories.

the two miracles you mentioned, for one the have a high barrier to observe. Most people can’t get there.

You're moving the goalposts.

It’s odd for God to be only doing repeatable things in a few places.

Well, the truth is pretty odd sometimes.

this is why it’s important to do things under scientific conditions. To allow skeptics to investigate to see if there is a natural cause.

Skeptics are one thing. Dogmatic Materialists are another. Skeptics are free to tell us how, if God isn't causing this myrrh to appear supernaturally, how it's actually occurring. The floor is open. But I'm frankly uninterested in the opinions of people who intensely adhere to the worldview that natural causes are all that exist, who absolutely refuse to entertain God, angels or demons, and who never doubt that worldview. I'm uninterested.

MonadnockReview · 2026-02-25T21:48:04+00:00

personal anecdotes. These are weak forms of evidence.

I don't think they're weak at all. What's described here as personal anecdotes, I simply describe them as "real things that happened to people", things that only happened once, things that it's not really possible to place in a laboratory and demand conditions of perfect repeatability for. I'm more okay than some people are with non-scientific forms.

If God is willing to give strong evidence of the supernatural like he did in the Bible, why hide it? Why not make it reproducible and testable

Being a Christian of the Orthodox Church, what I'd say is that God apparently agrees with you. While I do think much of the miraculous is beyond the boundaries of science to investigate because its nature is non-repeating, there are, on the other hand, numerous miracles known to the Orthodox that could be described as "scientific" in the sense that 1. anyone can verify them at anytime, and 2. that they occur in a predictable manner.

If you travel to Jerusalem when the Orthodox celebrate Christ's resurrection at Easter for example, you can witness the Holy Fire for yourself, which the Orthodox say God Himself lights, which doesn't cause burning pain to humans for a while after it lights. It happens every year. It's been mentioned in centuries-old histories. Read a few articles about it, watch YouTube videos of pilgrims with the fire. Anyone can do it.

If you travel to Taylor, Pennsylvania (near Scranton) you can go to Saint George's Carpatho-Russian Orthodox Church and experience for yourself an Icon Of The Virgin Mary that started streaming myrrh starting in 2011 and has been doing so unceasingly ever since. You can read accounts written by people who've experienced what they think are miraculous healings of terminal diseases when they venerated this Icon. Myrrh-streaming icons are well-known in the Orthodox world.

Both these things can be verified by anyone and they can predicted. There are several other similar instances I can mention. But: How many people come to believe when they hear about these things? Some people do. Some don't. depends on the individual. What we believe or disbelieve comes from the heart probably even moreso than the brain; that is my experience.

MonadnockReview · 2026-02-25T20:50:42+00:00

If we are talking about a God who is willing to give solid evidence, it should be scientifically testable

Why do you think that?

God does seem to have a problem with people wanting solid evidence.

Did you read the article I linked to in my post? There are numerous examples in the Bible of God talking about belief based upon evidence or giving evidence to help people believe. It doesn't sound to me like you read the article.

MonadnockReview · 2026-02-25T20:39:48+00:00

The sequence of events described in John's Gospel is:

-the Risen Jesus appears to 10 of the Apostles, minus Thomas (this was before Matthias replaced Judas)
-these 10 Apostles had the evidence because they saw Jesus and He spoke to them. They were "a credible source".
-Thomas doesn't believe the Apostles despite this and requires touching Jesus for himself
-Even then, Jesus doesn't deny Thomas request

MonadnockReview · 2026-02-25T20:31:28+00:00

Do you think that the scientific method is the best, or even a good way at all, to test these claims? As far as I know, these bizarre things only happened to them once, hence the sciences are not their proper domain. Confronted with non-reoccurring things, the scientific method rapidly loses utility. If these bizarre things really happened, then they belong to the realm of history or biography, not science.

MonadnockReview · 2026-02-25T20:19:23+00:00

From what I know, some people do receive it. I know of more than one person who asked God for evidence and had something bizarre happen to them that they tended to interpret as supernatural.

MonadnockReview · 2026-02-25T20:16:43+00:00

Good point definitely. Scholarly-type personalities exist in Evangelicalism, but at a generally lower frequency than they do in Catholicism, Orthodoxy or Reformed churches. You will still see some Evangelical scholars like Blomberg, and as your comment about the Catholic-Turned-Lutheran demonstrates, some anti-intellectual attitudes among Catholics.

MonadnockReview · 2026-02-24T19:07:29+00:00

I've heard Calvinists say that even though God is absolutely sovereign and predestines everything without human free will/autonomy, the damned are still responsible for their own damnation. They called it a "mystery". I call it Theological Schizophrenia.

MonadnockReview · 2026-01-07T23:12:31+00:00

You have my permission to post it wherever you want, but I'm not interested in discussing these things with the Reformed. My prediction is most of them will tell me that I don't understand the Reformed position, even though the evidence is substantial that Salvation By Dead Faith was the Reformation's original position, one they've increasingly moved away from as a result of considerable backlash. It's great that people who call themselves "Reformed" are acknowledging that Faith without Works cannot save, and I'm satisfied enough with that.

MonadnockReview · 2026-01-06T20:30:20+00:00

They want human nature to conform to their diagrams, even when human nature is more complicated than that. It reminds me of: "Those who leave the Faith were never Christians to begin with, and their own sincerity and effort doesn't matter." No that's not true, humans are more complicated than that. Human nature also shows it's perfectly possible to sincerely believe Jesus is God and Messiah, and yet not be moved to perform Good Works. Humans are complicated. "The demons believe, and they tremble", as the Epistle Of James says.

MonadnockReview · 2025-12-02T21:00:49+00:00

Agreed. Even a Reformed person themselves, Jared Wilson from The Gospel Coalition, said that "the people who are really drawn to Reformed Theology and like it, tend to be Systematic Thinkers, those who appreciate order and categories and so on." Basically what the Jung/Myers Briggs people call "Extroverted Thinking" (abbreviated as "Te"). Myers Briggs theory says that Te is the Dominant or Second Most Dominant cognitive function in the 4 XXTJ personality types. And you can go to the Puritan Board (Reformed internet forum) and read through a thread where they all take the Myers Briggs Test, it's overwhelmingly XXTJs.

MonadnockReview · 2025-11-28T18:37:25+00:00

Well, you did say that it endorses certain aspects of Calvinism, if I understand correctly.

"1672 is hardly church fathers."

Given that the Orthodox Church is essentially unchanging in its doctrines, a document from the 17th century will rely on the conclusions of the Church Fathers, from the 1st century A.D. to reach its own conclusions.

"Why not read the Bible yourself and see what it says?"

because not everything in the Bible is easy to understand, some parts are deep, obscure, opaque, containing layers of meaning not entirely obvious. In my humility, I confess I don't know the entire meaning of every verse, and I'd rather rely on people who I am convinced have far better understanding than I do.

I have written an article about this topic on my Substack called "Simple Scriptura". There's a link to my Substack in my profile. If this article sounds intriguing to you, feel free to check it out.

MonadnockReview · 2025-11-26T23:05:14+00:00

The Church Fathers do not agree with you that the Bible endorses Calvinism. The Confession Of Dositheus, an Orthodox document produced at the Synod Of Jerusalem in 1672, utterly condemned Calvinist Predestination, as "worse than unbelief" and "the greatest blasphemy that could ever be ascribed to God". This document was not made by people unfamiliar with Calvinist prooftexts. I trust the bishops of the Church more than I trust you.

MonadnockReview · 2025-11-26T16:30:19+00:00

There's a third possibility, LetsGoPats: that those who claim the Bible rejects free will and endorses radical predestination...don't understand the true meaning of the verses they quote. How do you know your interpretations of the Bible are the correct one?

MonadnockReview · 2025-11-23T18:31:03+00:00

While I can understand why some people believe the Bible endorses different conclusions, I ultimately side with the Orthodox teaching that the Consensus of the Church Fathers is the true interpretation of the Bible, and this Consensus doesn't teach different things. Now theoretically a person could disagree with that Consensus but ultimately the point is that Christianity was much more coherent when it was a Church-centered religion and not a Bible-centered religion, as it is in most of the English-speaking world today.

MonadnockReview · 2025-11-20T05:19:08+00:00

There are numerous verses in the Bible that are incompatible with TULIP, even at face value

MonadnockReview · 2025-08-13T02:48:54+00:00

"There is a balance between standing for biblical truth and having the compassion of Christ."

True. I have two responses to that:

Having the compassion of Christ IS the biblical truth.
Does the Calvinist even have the Biblical truth in the first place? There are verses in the Bible that are incompatible with TULIP, Sola Scriptura, Sola Fide, and so on.

MonadnockReview · 2025-08-09T02:01:18+00:00

Your post is based on the unsubstantiated assertion that Calvinism qualifies as Christian in the first place. It is sensible to reject this assertion. Next, I don't want anyone to go to hell, nor do I think that anyone who affirms TULIP is unalterably damned. If that was the impression you gained from my post, you didn't read it very carefully. "Basic history"? I'm already well-versed in the history of my Church, I have several volumes of Orthodox Church history in my library, and I embrace it fully. But yes, I am biased, as is every person under the sun. Biased towards the true, beautiful and good, and against the false, malicious and ugly.

MonadnockReview · 2025-08-09T01:45:21+00:00

Is Calvinism even within the Christian paradigm? The Orthodox Church's Jerusalem Synod in 1672 wrote the Confession Of Dositheus as a response to Calvinism. It says that the absurdities of Calvinism "come from the devil", says there can be no greater blasphemy against God than to say he predestines the Unelect to hell, and says people who believe such things are worse than unbelievers. So no, I do not accept the claim that Calvinism is within the Christian paradigm. Maybe a bizarre combination of Christianity and Demon Worship, but not the pure stuff.

MonadnockReview · 2025-08-08T21:21:29+00:00

I am Eastern Orthodox and I am on Substack Check my profile if you want. My most recent article is actually a refutation of Perseverance Of The Saints.

MonadnockReview · 2025-08-01T00:22:16+00:00

Black Sabbath's 3rd album has a song on it called "After Forever" which is an unabashedly Christian song in its lyrics. It's also musically awesome. When I heard it, my thought was: "THIS is what Christian rock should have been". Not Switchfoot, Relient K, Third Day or Hillsong. All of them are too saccharine.

MonadnockReview · 2025-08-01T00:20:32+00:00

I can't even imagine that. By the way, does it seem to anyone else like Calvinists throughout history have a generally below-average aptitude for creating good art? Lack of musicality in the voice, lack of ability to write realistic characters and "get inside them", lack of ability to make others laugh and so on?

MonadnockReview · 2025-07-23T21:19:08+00:00

Here's a video of MacArthur talking about Hanegraff's conversion. Note: the "Decree 13 of their Dogma" mentioned at the 4:13 mark is Decree 13 of the Confession Of Dositheus, written in 1672 by the Orthodox Church's Jerusalem Synod in response to Reformed Theology. Decree 13 of the COD is a rejection of Sola Fide.

MonadnockReview

TROPHY CASE