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Spiritual Continuity Tremper Longman III presents the Spiritiual Continuity view of the Canaanite annihilation. First, I would like to say that I love Longman’s analysis of chosen biblical background material. Whether one agrees with his view, there are rich insights to be gained here. I thoroughly enjoyed reading this section of the book. What Longman means by spiritual continuity is rather well explained. He sees a transformation from the old era of physical battle versus God’s enemies (and therefore, Israel’s) to a new one of spiritual warfare. Jesus is seen as the Divine Warrior found in the Old Testament but He has “intensified and heightened the battle.” The enemy is cast no longer as a flesh and bone one but a spiritual one. Weapons of war are transformed from physical ones to spiritual ones. While there are those who look to the Old Testament depiction of God vs. the New Testament Jesus and see incredible dissimilarity, Longman sees continuity. Violence from the hand of ...

That's a Great Question: What to Say When Your Faith Is Questioned  Recommended by Ravi Zacharias  Kindle Edition free for a limited time by Glenn Pearson Knowing the Truth About Jesus the Messiah (The Defenders)  Kindle Edition free for a limited time by John Ankerberg Alive: A Cold-Case Approach to the Resurrection   1.99 on the Kindle by J. Warner Wallace Every Prophecy of the Bible: Clear Explanations for Uncertain Times   99 cents on Kindle by John F. Walvoord

E.M. Bounds books on prayer for free on Kindle Power Through Prayer The Weapon of Prayer The Necessity of Prayer The Possibilities of Prayer Purpose in Prayer The Reality of Prayer Defying ISIS: Preserving Christianity in the Place of Its Birth and in Your Own Backyard Mar 13, 2015 | Kindle eBook by Johnnie Moore   $7.99 A Christian genocide at the hands of Islamic extremists is unfolding in the Middle East. Entire Christian populations have been eliminated, and the ultimate aim of ISIS and the Islamic State is to eradicate the world of Christianity. They are well on their way. Thousands of Christians arrive in refugee camps daily as tents can be seen for miles across the countryside of Jordan, N. Iraq and Lebanon. Churches have been demolished, crosses burned and replaced with ISIS flags, homes destroyed, entire communities displaced, religious conversions forced, human torture enacted, children slaughtered, and all in plain sight. In many cities every single...

Thanksgiving Eve Service 11/25/2015 Note: this is a sermon-free service. It is a simple outline service with reasons to be thankful and a passage and hymns to go with them. I had one member of the congregation give thanks for each section and ended with a group of thankfulness testimonies.  It can be adapted for your purposes. We also had two special music numbers. Of course, it could be turned into a sermon-based or devotional emphasis simply by reducing the stanzas, not including a testimonial for each portion or reducing the portions or perhaps a combination of those while expounding on the Scripture. You may also decide to alter the order, add or subtract as this primes your pump, so to speak.    Opening Hymn : We Gather Together I am thankful for my salvation 1 Peter 1:3-10 Calvary Covers It All I am thankful for God’s sovereignty Daniel 4:3-5 Have Faith in God I am thankful for God’s love John 3:16-17 My Savior’s Love I am thankful for...

Picture Perfect Free for a limited time Also free on Vyrso and iBooks Frankly, Your Perfectionism Isn’t Enough. Perfectionism is a crushing burden that can leave us angry, anxious, and paralyzed. But the quest for perfection will never transform a heart. Amy Baker examines the root and purpose of the longing for perfection to show how God’s grace transforms the aching “not enough” of perfectionism into the overflowing abundance of faith. Amy Baker, PhD, is the Ministry Resource Director at Faith Church (Lafayette, IN); Director of Counseling for Vision of Hope, a faith-based residential treatment program; Instructor and counselor at Faith Biblical Counseling Ministries; a council member of the Biblical Counseling Coalition: and the author of Getting to the Heart of Friendships as well as several counseling minibooks. She and her husband Jeff have two children. Don’t Follow Your Heart (New Book) Free in various formats: Pdf, Mobi (Kindle) and Epub (Apple, N...

View Number 3: Eschatological Continuity Daniel L. Gard’s position is that of Eschatological Continuity. To summarize, this view sees ancient Israel as God’s theological, political and chosen people to punish the Canaanites via genocide and occupy a land that God had granted them. God acted through Israel to perform this function. Gard goes further into the Old Testament also to argue that sometimes God acted solely in the destruction of His enemies in a type of herem. He sees that as the only justifiable genocide of history and it will only be repeated by God in the last days when he commits a final herem upon the people of the Earth. There is a lot to praise in this portion of the book though I don’t favor his view. On page 116, Gard gives a great summary of what herem (or the ban) means and how it was acted out in the biblical accounts versus the Canaanites. Rooted in what I see as his evident Reformed background, Gard is terrific on the attributes of God and thus His character ...

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Eugene Merrill’s case for moderate discontinuity is my preferred interpretation. Without having read it, I came to the same conclusions as he had save the use of the term genocide. More on that in a few paragraphs. I will label this the dispensational view. It is further evidence, I believe, of how faithful dispensationalism is to the biblical text. It alone accounts for the seeming incongruity of Jesus’ ministry of salvation, mercy and grace with the judgment of the Canaanites in their wholesale annihilation by God as represented in the Old Testament. One of the things I appreciate is the depth of Merrill’s material that he explains from the Word of God. He believes, rightly I would say, that the wholesale killing of the Canaanites was the judgment of God on a specific people (the Canaanites), at a specific period (the claiming of the land of promise under Joshua), by means of a specific agent (the Israelites) for a specific purpose (to claim the land promised to them ...

What a missionary in Europe shared with us regarding a Syrian refugee who claims to having been converted to Christ First, a note (from me): this confirms from another angle the story that we have heard from Christian mission/relief agencies that Muslims are startled to receive aid from Christians since, as they related, they would not give such aid to Christians. This has led to Muslims seeking to know more about Jesus and Christianity. As the missionary related the story: G-- , the three-week refugee from Syria, came to the house for a longer get-acquainted session. S.B., a fluent Arabic-speaking colleague from southern France, gave us a lengthy Skype interview to collect G--'s story. I'll not tell it in detail, but suffice it to say that what impressed him the most was the marked contrast between the work of Saudi-financed humanitarian aid in Syrian refugee camps in Turkey (where he had served as a translator), and that of Christians.  The Saudis would ask children's...

On one of the google communities, I had a discussion with an atheist. One of the things that he brought up was the annihilation of the Canaanites by the Israelites. This cruel God of the Bible, as he described Him, was not one he could embrace. We had been talking about something else when he made this turn in the conversation. I remarked that I had not studied the issue much but that I was not afraid of the Bible's difficult to understand passages. As I said to him, I had a book called Show Them No Mercy: 4 Views on God and Canaanite Genocide and that I would make that the next book that I read.  As I began to read the book, I decided to summarize the four viewpoints contained therein. I will do this as a four part series of blog posts. What is important for the reader to understand is that these are my summaries and certainly the authors of the sections and views could dispute my summation and/or interpretation as could those who hold those views. This post offers you a l...

1 Corinthians by Warren Wiersbe is free for a limited time Also available for free on Google Play, iBooks, BookShout, Barnes and Noble BE Series The Gospels Bundle is only $4.61!  Also available on Google Play, iBooks, and Barnes and Noble Finding Truth by Nancy Pearcey for $5.99 Nancy Pearcey, bestselling and critically acclaimed author, offers fresh tools to break free from presumed certainties and test them against reality. In Finding Truth, she explains five powerful principles that penetrate to the core of any worldview—secular or religious—to uncover its deepest motivations and weigh its claims. A former agnostic, Pearcey demonstrates that a robust Christian worldview matches reality—that it is not only true but attractive, granting higher dignity to the human person than any alternative. Finding Truth displays Pearcey’s well-earned reputation for clear and cogent writing. She brings themes to life with personal stories and real-world examples. A...

Leroy Eims' book is  free for a limited time Free for a limited time "Many of you have asked how I became a Christian, how Saeed became a Christian, and how we met. This recent interview that I did with Billy Graham Radio will give you a glimpse into our journey including a time when we were threatened to be imprisoned and killed if we said that we were Christians. While every fiber of my being told me to not to say the word, God gave me the Grace and strength to proclaim that I was a Christian. You can listen to this interview and learn how God touched and changed the heart of our persecutor." -- Naghmeh Abedini “You will be brought before governors and kings for My sake, as a testimony to them and to the Gentiles. But when they deliver you up, do not worry about how or what you should speak. For it will be given to you in that hour what you should speak; for it is not you who speak, but the Spirit of your Father who speaks in you.” Matthe...

I Will: Nine Traits of the Outwardly Focused Christian  by Thom Rainer is the latest in a series of books by the author to help the church by helping the average church member. An Autopsy of a Deceased Church sought to take a look at common traits that lead to the decline and death of churches and encouraged believers to avoid those pitfalls. I Am a Church Member was an effort by Rainer to address the attitudes of church membership and how to be a better church member. I Will takes that a step further by addressing church members' behaviors.  I think I Will does for the average layperson what What Is a Healthy Church Member? by Thabiti M. Anyabwile may do for a more intellectual layperson. In fact, that is one of the things that I have loved about Thom Rainer. One doesn’t need an advanced degree to understand what in the world he is talking about. He speaks in a language people understand, giving important data in a relevant way that they can apply in very p...

In Numbers 13, we have recorded the names of 12 men. Their names are listed there for all to see. Tasked to spy out the land of Canaan ahead of the conquests, these 12 would report back on what they found. Forever, their names are linked with their reports. The majority shrunk back in fear while a vocally strong minority wanted to trust God no matter the obstacles, claiming God's promises that the land was theirs for the taking. You have a name and you are developing a reputation. Is it that you have trusted God or that you shrunk back in fear? Choose wisely how you develop that name and reputation, for others are watching and will follow. Numbers 13:27-33 (NKJV) “We went to the land where you sent us. It truly flows with milk and honey, and this is its fruit. Nevertheless the people who dwell in the land are strong; the cities are fortified and very large; moreover we saw the descendants of Anak there. The Amalekites dwell in the land of the South; the Hittites, the Jebusit...

Counterpoint Series on Sale through September 13 The Counterpoints series provides a forum for comparison and critique of different views on issues important to Christians. Covering diverse topics in the areas of theology, biblical studies, and church life including volumes on the historical Adam, hell, biblical inerrancy, baptism, divine providence, evolution, the rapture, women in ministry, eternal security, the Canaanite genocide, and much more. Featuring contributions by today's most respected scholars and top including Michael F. Bird, Darrell L. Bock, Craig L. Blomberg, Wayne A. Grudem, Michael Horton, Tremper Longman III, Douglas J. Moo, Thomas R. Schreiner, Kevin J. Vanhoozer, John H. Walton, and many more. The Holy Spirit (The Gospel Coalition Booklets) Kindle Edition by Kevin DeYoung Free for a limited time Stronger: Trading Brokenness for Unbreakable Strength by Jim Daly of Focus on the Family Free through Tuesday, Sept. 8, 201...

Something that has occurred to me is the number of people who attend church and inevitably someone says something insensitive, hurts them and then they leave, seemingly never to return. Now, don't get me wrong, but to me this seems like one of the Devil's greatest tricks in payoffs. The sheer number of people who give in to this dirty trick is astounding. I've talked with other Christian leaders and they tell me the same thing. So, if this describes you, please know that the church is full of redeemed sinners but they are still sinners. Inevitably, one of them will say something that will sting. In fact, sooner or later, you will say something to your pastor or a fellow believer that will hurt. Stay long enough, and more than likely, I will also say something stupid that may hurt you. This is because I am a sinner as well. Now pick yourself up off the floor. It really isn't that shocking. If I left because someone said something to me that hurt me, I probably w...

China’s Hero Eric Liddell Is Honored with Statue BBC's Eric Liddell's Story :  Chariots of Fire's Eric Liddell is Chinese 'hero' Samir's Story Samir has no money, no job, and his kids are begging him for food because they haven’t eaten in days. He has nowhere to turn, and ISIS is on his doorstep. The only glimmer of hope comes when local missionaries supported by Christian Aid Mission tell Samir about a God-man called Jesus. Pakistan: Christian man shot dead by Muslim in-laws The family of a Christian man who was shot dead by his Muslim in-laws is now being threatened also. The couple's lawyer is also receiving threats. Aleem Masih, 28, married Nadia, 23, last year and they moved nearly 40 miles away from Lahore to Narang Mandi to escape her family. Lawyer Aneeqa Maria of The Voice Society told Morning Star News that the couple had petitioned Lahore High Court for police protection due to threats they and Masih's family had received. Acco...

Christians Are Hate-Filled Hypocrites and Other Lies You've Been Told 99 cents Be Loyal: Matthew Commentary by Warren Wiersb e Free today (Friday, Aug. 28, 2015) Perspectives on the Extent of the Atonement: 3 Views 99 cents Perspectives on Israel and the Church : 4 Views 99 cents Perspectives on Your Child's Education: 4 Views 99 cents