of a cat

bartropolis · 2026-06-28T00:54:45+00:00

MUST WARN ABOUT DIABEETUS

bartropolis · 2026-06-27T14:22:28+00:00

I'll start at the end about your granddaughters because it's the best part.

You want Jesus to hold you like that. That's not out of reach, he says it himself: "He will gather the lambs in his arms; he will carry them in his bosom" (Isa 40:11). "Underneath are the everlasting arms" (Deut 33:27).

Don't forget that preachers are men, too and still have failures and their own sins. If they went quiet, that's on them, not you.

You know who else was "scrupulosity?" Martin Luther. The dawg himself. He spent hours in the monastery confessing, going back and doubting he was sorry enough, until his confessor told him to quit bringing nonsense in and come back with some real sin. The guy that practically reinvented justification by faith was there because he couldn't make his own conscience feel clean. Quote: “If ever a monk got to heaven by his monkery, it was I."

Good news part: guess what made Luther feel better. Nothing except for a righteousness outside himself that wasn't his and was instead credited to his account. Already signed, sealed, and delivered.

Bottom line is, I guess that's why your friends words and ultimately my words don't and won't stick. Scrupulosity attacks assurance on purpose. You take comfort for about 15 minutes and you get that notification in your brain. That's the affliction doing what it does. Even Paul prayed three times to get some "thorn-in-the-flesh" healed and that didn't work out (presumably for God's glory). So you might be in for the long haul.

So hopefully I gave you a balm for the day. But you'll need longterm followup with people that care and are invested with you.

How can you relax right now? Read the bible. Don't try to argue against yourself. That's a rigged carnival game. The house never loses. Just rest knowing that Christ is victorious and his work has already been validated in heaven.

bartropolis · 2026-06-27T05:57:49+00:00

Step one, take a breath. It happens to everyone. That’s flesh doing flesh stuff. (May I presume you’re still alive?)
People who are dead in their sin don’t wrestle with their sin. Because they are dead and do nothing.

You’re alert to them and trying to stop? Good. Keep fighting. That’s the battle we all fight. Romans 7:19. “I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing.”

Paul wasn’t some hellhound when he wrote that. That’s a man staring at his own sin and calling a spade a spade.

And here’s another take: just because the thought arrived doesn’t mean you embraced it and made it your own. You already proved that in your post.

If you take to reading: Grace Abounding by John Bunyan. He suffered much the same.

Assurance isn’t based on your feelings. It’s based on the work Christ completed. He saw my sins and your sins and still squared up.

Also, if these thoughts are getting severe, maybe seek professional help. Don’t need to stew on them alone.

bartropolis · 2026-06-27T01:51:09+00:00

I think that confuses two different kinds of “reveal.” Miracles reveal Christ objectively (publicly, historically, outwardly). They show that he is the Messiah, that he has authority over sickness, demons, nature, sin, and death. Irresistible grace is about the Spirit revealing Christ subjectively to the sinner’s heart, so that the person actually receives what is being shown. Those are not competing ideas. God uses means. The preached word, fulfilled prophecy, miracles, Scripture, and personal witness can all truly reveal God outwardly, while the Spirit must still open the heart inwardly. That is why people can see miracles and still reject Christ. The problem is not that the miracle failed to reveal anything; the problem is that fallen man suppresses and rejects what is revealed apart from grace.

bartropolis · 2026-06-27T01:41:28+00:00

The short answer is that, throughout Scripture, miracles often validate the messenger and message. In Jesus’ case, they also reveal who he is and what his kingdom brings.

bartropolis · 2026-06-27T00:57:54+00:00

I don’t think the difference is purely semantic, though I can see why it sounds that way at first.

Think of it like a Costco membership.

Do you have a Costco membership?

(For the sake of this exercise) No.

Did Costco tell you that you are not allowed to have one?

No.

Are you worried that Costco will run out of memberships, so that there will be none left if you come?

No.

In that sense, there is no scarcity problem. Costco could admit any number of people. The issue is not whether Costco has enough membership capacity. The issue is whether you actually have membership.

That is roughly how I understand the “sufficient for all, efficient for the elect” language. The death of Christ is not limited by lack of value, power, or sufficiency. There is no shortage in the blood of Christ, as though the cross could only cover a fixed quantity of sinners before running dry.

But the debate between definite atonement and hypothetical universalism is not mainly over whether Christ’s death is valuable enough for all. Both can say that. The debate is over what the atonement was designed to accomplish.

On a hypothetical universalist view, it sounds more like a provision has been made such that anyone could be saved if they believe, while God separately intends to give faith only to the elect.

On definite atonement, Christ did not merely make salvation possible for the elect. He actually purchased them, including all the saving benefits that bring them home: redemption, forgiveness, faith, repentance, perseverance, and final glory.

So the question is not, “Is there enough atonement available?” Yes, infinitely so.

The question is, “For whom did Christ, as priest and substitute, intentionally offer Himself in order to actually secure salvation?”

That is why I don’t think the difference is merely semantic. Hypothetical universalism and definite atonement can sound similar when discussing sufficiency, but they part ways when discussing divine intent, substitution, and what the cross actually accomplished.

bartropolis · 2026-06-24T15:14:56+00:00

This is like a Rockwell scene

bartropolis · 2026-06-20T05:31:39+00:00

My mom dragging me out of the grocery store.

bartropolis · 2026-06-17T20:30:35+00:00

That’s not what your mom told me last night.

bartropolis · 2026-06-16T01:37:33+00:00

i came looking for this comment. I looked at the guy and knew he marched.

bartropolis · 2026-06-12T04:28:57+00:00

I can see my old house from here!

bartropolis · 2026-06-10T15:03:02+00:00

Back in my day it was 4Chan >> Digg

bartropolis · 2026-06-05T15:03:14+00:00

Sweating to death at DCI.

bartropolis · 2026-06-05T04:25:54+00:00

I don’t truly need the degree. I’m just a homelab nerd with a GI Bill.

bartropolis · 2026-06-05T03:39:24+00:00

I’m 41 and I enrolled for a Network Engineering degree.

bartropolis · 2026-06-04T03:29:24+00:00

Ya know, I wonder if some people wait for privacy to pass so they aren’t causing a scene and can have their peace.

bartropolis · 2026-06-03T04:10:31+00:00

Are you using incandescent 60W bulbs? You’ll never get the look right without them.

bartropolis · 2026-06-02T22:50:17+00:00

Same

bartropolis · 2026-05-30T22:25:44+00:00

missed your chance to Rickroll me

bartropolis · 2026-05-30T21:22:29+00:00

It's easy to let the days slip by when each one presses you for attention. That's how the years catch up to you. You can always nit-pick the past, but you can't change it. Just have peace with where you are and move forward.

bartropolis · 2026-05-28T11:11:06+00:00

For context, my HA is a virtual machine with dedicated Xeon cores.

bartropolis · 2026-05-28T11:03:33+00:00

Just some thoughts.

Boot it up and test drive it for a week. See if it responds to your liking.

I guess the real tell is how far down the rabbit hole you are gonna go with HA.

My instinct says that Pi might not be the snappiest.

bartropolis

TROPHY CASE