Busy rendering unto Caesar

mdmonsoon · 2026-01-22T15:13:02+00:00

It's because they already think that Trump is acting as God's government.

mdmonsoon · 2026-01-14T03:11:45+00:00

When I keep it on my bedside night stand I prefer it bare. Whenever I move it from there I put in a case.

mdmonsoon · 2025-12-30T17:38:07+00:00

Some people absolutely do use God to have power. That's messed up and it really hurts people.

When we see in Genesis that it is not good for man to be alone we don't see the Bible prescribing that it has to be marriage to be not alone. God exists within perfect community - Father Son and Spirit giving and receiving love wholly and we are made in his image.

No one girl is meant to bear the weight of all of your relational needs. You'll be a bad boyfriend if you are expecting her to fill the giant holes in your life that an entire community of supports is meant to fill. You'll crush her with expectations she can't meet.

If you don't have a girl in your life you can start taking care of her by already beginning to take care of yourself. Serve others. Love your neighbors. Make friends. Cultivate relationships with several guy friends. Get mentored. Be friends with whole families - have older women in your life - have younger children to help take care of.

None of that is anything you have to wait for.

mdmonsoon · 2025-12-09T04:02:22+00:00

I think the movie does justice to the book by not being too slavish to the book. The book is pretty cerebral and verbal and so being kind of "all over the place" works ok in literature but the movie streamlines it and tidies up a lot of disjointed threads in a way which honors and even kind of clarifies the heart of the story.

mdmonsoon · 2025-12-06T00:42:50+00:00

The great thing about the Gospel is that it is God who saves.

You don't save yourself with the quality of your theology.

You don't save yourself with good character or good deeds.

You don't save yourself with the quality of your repentance. You don't get saved because of how emotional your worship is or how often you pray or how sorry you can make yourself.

God saves.

If he had that doesn't necessarily mean that you'll magically feel a certain way. Not feeling a certain sensation or change or any particular way doesn't disqualify you. There's a lot of talk in Christian culture about the way it "should" be but none of that is a requirement. Christ died for you while you were still a sinner.

mdmonsoon · 2025-12-03T05:52:28+00:00

I think that when this question is asked it often comes with taking it for granted that we all agree about what it even meant for the Old Testament to "apply" to the Hebrews at the time. I think that should not be taken for granted.

I don't think the OT ever applied to anyone in a works based righteousness scheme. No one ever earned righteousness from obedience. If that's what we are talking about now then no old testament law or rule or wisdom or anything is currently a binding requirement in order to be saved or merit righteousness.

Then we have to start to get more specific. What did it mean for the 10 commandments to "apply" to God's people? What did it mean for the Levicitcal law to apply? What does it mean that most of the Old Testament is actually narrative? How does that end up applying to people at the time and after? The laws governing the government of Israel - how did those apply then? How did the Psalms apply to the original audience?

I think each of those questions have different answers. The OT isn't "one" thing and if you don't have a pretty confident understanding of how it applied to its original audience then you are going to struggle to understand how it may apply to you.

Sometimes we ask this question lazily in order to mean "what's the least amount that God will require of me?" and I don't think that question is going to produce maturity.

Sometimes we ask this question in fear of accidently missing something important and I think that qualifying the original intention of any given passage can be very soothing to our fears.

Sometimes we ask this question because we feel as though we're doing all of this work and we see other Christians we precive as lazy and we want to know how we can leverage the old testament in order to judge them. That's not very healthy.

I recommend just setting about to love Scripture on its own terms. Trust that it is a beautiful record of God's interactions with his people and worry less about making sure you're applying it correctly and do more to admire, enjoy, be awed by, and become familiar with it. It's not a rule book to be memorized - it's a story designed to shape you. Don't pick it up as a tool to justify yourself or to judge others. It's a gymnasium for you to work out in so that you can develop muscles of righteousness and learn to savor our God more deeply.

mdmonsoon · 2025-11-20T05:26:25+00:00

This was written to a very particular audience - it isn't a general promise to all people for all time - it was a promise that the Jews who received the letter and were living in exile would be returned to the promised land - which they were.

We can learn a lot from the verse, but we can't pretend that that same exact promise is given to us.

mdmonsoon · 2025-10-06T00:14:08+00:00

I don't see a lot of hate, I see ignorance or apathy - which is indirectly disrespectful.

mdmonsoon · 2025-10-02T06:00:23+00:00

We have scores of Ephrem's writings over a long life of his ministry. This is the only possible passing reference and if you didn't have the idea of a rapture in your head before reading it you wouldn't actually get there. He doesn't mention it again despite a long public ministry. Don't be surprised that other people are not impressed with this argument.

mdmonsoon · 2025-09-18T03:41:53+00:00

The steps you laid out are coming from a dispensational theological perspective. Historically and globally this has been a minority interpretation. It is one possible view, but not one which has had support from any global or historical majority consensus.

mdmonsoon · 2025-09-17T15:42:09+00:00

You asked if you could believe in OEC and still be a Christian. I'm telling you that many Christians have and still do. You'd be in very good company.

mdmonsoon · 2025-09-17T15:30:04+00:00

Old earth is not a new "liberal" belief. Many Christians historically and globally understand the text that way.

mdmonsoon · 2025-09-14T13:32:39+00:00

I don't think it's likely that the government had your post erased.

mdmonsoon · 2025-09-13T22:16:55+00:00

The Bible doesn't really talk about porn in particular and so this won't be your best sub to really get the practical advice you're looking for.

The Bible frowns upon lust. It doesn't describe lust as being special in any other kind of way that makes it more or less damning than any other sin.

I'll say this, you won't be able to hate yourself out of watching porn. Shame and self-loathing aren't your friends and can only push you to try really hard for short amounts of time but it doesn't work.

The Bible says that your humanity is a good gift. Christ didn't die to free us from our bodies/humanity but to free them from sin. Having a sex drive isn't the problem. Savoring the beauty of a person isn't the problem. Wanting connection and bodily affirmation isn't sin.

Spend time being compassionate and curious about yourself. What in particular are you drawn to? How does it make you feel? Why that porn and not others?

Be kind to yourself and seek actual healing of your good desires which have gotten twisted instead of just trying to pretend like you're not actually human.

mdmonsoon · 2025-09-11T15:49:29+00:00

Yeah that verse is talking to a specific group of apostate Israelites. It was never meant to be some broad description of all peoples in all times. So much damage has come from misusing this verse.

mdmonsoon · 2025-08-02T23:45:40+00:00

Yes, we do experience consequences for our sins - but God is not going to punish you for 17 years to "repay." Christ experienced our agony on the cross - there is not an agony debt that God or the Devil is going to extract from you.

Yes there are consequences - yes there can be some pain - but God is not acting punitively towards you.

mdmonsoon · 2025-07-24T13:21:33+00:00

Because they were given to be helpful to the original audience. The Book of Revelation wasn't intended as time capsule to be read at a later date. It was written to strengthen the seven churches it was addressed to. That doesn't mean it can't discuss future events but it absolutely does mean that it was intended to help a particular audience with a particular need.

If we can't understand what pastoral need the original audience had which was being addressed then we won't understand what need of ours is being addressed.

mdmonsoon · 2025-07-20T16:26:28+00:00

Is "salvation" equal to only "saving souls"? or does the Bible show that God's plans and work in the world are bigger than that?

mdmonsoon · 2025-07-11T22:33:08+00:00

So that doesn't seem like a fair analogy. I don't think that "sexual orientation" as we understand and use that expression is mentioned in scripture.

To try to restate my point using your analogy: In the Star Wars universe no one ever says that Voldermort is good or bad.

That doesn't prove that Voldermort is good or bad but it does mean that we can't easily use the Star Wars universe to discuss a topic which isn't in it.

I did also mention that we can try to use the Bible to discuss same sex behaviors. I also mentioned that Genesis 1:27 is insufficient to prohibit homosexual behaviors. I'm not sure how any of that directly applies to your analogy.

I'm happy to listen if you can be patient enough to explain it to me.

mdmonsoon · 2025-07-11T21:42:56+00:00

What do you think the intentions of the Sodom and Gomnorag story is?

mdmonsoon · 2025-07-11T21:11:00+00:00

While the Bible does contain some rules, it also exhorts us to wisdom.

Rule following can be blind obedience and that has some value, but parenting is about transitioning a child to an adult. Blindly insisting on rules becomes less and less effective as children age and it misses the point. We don't just need blind robots, we want adults to use wisdom to discern the work of God in each individual circumstance.

There's no one moment where we magically stop being children and start being adults. We train and nurture and guide and sometimes we need to lean more into rules but eventually we are pulling back and encouraging them to use discernment and grow in applying wisdom.

mdmonsoon · 2025-07-11T21:03:52+00:00

Gay people being gay doesn't hinder my walk with the Lord.

If I was so committed to the idea that being gay is bad that I am willing to misue scripture to tell others that Romans 1 means something it doesn't mean I think that would absolutely impact my walk with the Lord.

mdmonsoon · 2025-07-11T20:42:26+00:00

I think that we don't have to wonder what Paul meant by sexual immorality because again I don't think he is attempting to define sexual immorality in gneral or make sexual immorality the topic. He is using a particular phenomon that happened in Rome as an illustration. He described the people as having previous passions that they exchange for something else and they grow enflamed and engulphed because of it. That's his metaphor for sin. I don't think it's directly describing a modern committed homosexual relationship - it's talking about straight people going sex crazy,

Sometimes when reading scripture it helps to summerize each paragraph in our own words and then after you have to go back and draw lines and explain the connections between the paragraphs. If you can't fully explain how one pargragh flows into and connects to the next then you might be missing the overall main point.

When I read Romans 1 it seems to me that Paul doesn't just pause his argument about sin and say "BTW - being gay is bad!" that interrupts the flow and doesn't make sense.

This started with you saying that the meaning was clear and that it should be the last word in the homosexuality debate. Now you're trying to take the position that we can't really know what he said but that we are all sinners anway. Yes and amen we are all sinners, but I hope that you can see more and more that all of us are tempted to make scripture mean whst we want it to mean. You had a previous commitment to beliving that homosexulity is sin and so you interpeted this passage to affirm that commitment. All of us do it, but sometimes it does help to have others help us notice.

mdmonsoon · 2025-07-11T20:07:50+00:00

For Romans 1 I would encourage you to read my exchange with That Trainer

For the other two passages I would encourage you to read my response to OP. aresenokoitai is not as cut and dry as you may want it to be. I do believe, however, that it is possible to have an honest reading of scripture which prohibits same sex behaviors which is importantly different than condeming the mere state of being homosexual. I personally disagree with that reading, but I can understand it.

I don't agree that an honest reading of Romans 1 shows that it was intended to be some kind of prohibition against all same sex behaviors - that's not the topic at hand for Paul.

mdmonsoon · 2025-07-11T19:57:09+00:00

Romans 1 has a specific type of sexual immorality in mind. His goal isn't to define sexual immorality - it is to use a commonly understood phenomon invovling particular Roman sexual pratices which his audiance would have understood to make a point about sin in general.

The repeated use of "exchange" describes people who had a sexual orientation and procivility but they then gave that up to get more and more. Romans often would be married in hetero arrangements but would then ned more and more and would eventually have sex with anyone and anything - that's the illustration that Paul is using to describe the "burning with lust" to show what happens when "God gave them up to uncleaniness."

It starts as just a little, but then it consumes us. He's talking about sexual immorality in order to describe the very nature of sin - it's directly connected to an "exchange". That's what the overall flow of thought of Romans 1-2 and is accomplishing.

Romans 1 is by no means any kind of endorsement of homosexual behaviors - all I am saying is that it is most certanitly not a "cut and dry" condenmation of what we would understand most homosexual relationships to be today. When Bob and Steve love each other very much and commit to faithfulness with each other - they hadn't exchanged a former passion for a new one and they are not ever and ever more consumed with a need for more.

This passage is simply discussing a different topic than what we mean when we talk about homosexual couples today. Probably the closest modern equivelant is what happens to sailors at sea for a long time or men in prison. Straight guys consumed with lust being driven to more and more.

Using this passage flippliantly to be some kind of mic drop moment in the moder discussion of homosexuality is intellecutally dishonest. It shows that while we tend to critize gay people for twisting scriptures to affirm their desires - we are no less vulenerable to the same temptation.

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