Recent content by David Lamb

Probably because there are plenty of people, some being true Christians, who don't believe what Baptists believe. Many believe that baptism is not for believers, but can be performed on little babies. Many, like the Anglicans, believe that Church and state are formally linked. And so I could...

So what is it that Baptists believe or do that prevents you from being one?

They meet together to worship God. They baptise people who have come to believe in Jesus Christ. They seek to make the gospel known to others, as you say you do. There are other Baptist distinctives such as the church being separate from the state.

Calvinism certainly does not view God as if He were the old man upstairs. Take the first paragraph of Part II of the Westminster Confession of Faith, for example: "II. Of God, and of the Holy Trinity I. There is but one only living and true God, who is infinite in being and perfection, a most...

But the verse you quoted doesn't mention grace being offered, just grace appearing, as it did when Jesus was on earth.

But the New Testament was written in Greek, with just a few words of Aramaic. There is in Greek a word for "cousin" and it isn't the same as the one for "brother." "Cousin" appears in this verse: “Aristarchus my fellow prisoner greets you, with Mark the cousin of Barnabas (about whom you...

Yes, with government of the people by the people, which is surely democracy. Republics can be democracies or not, just as monarchies can.

None can be saved if left to themselves. Like Lydia, whose heart the Lord opened to the truth, I now that my salvation depends on God. Not so - God enables us to believe on Hs Son for salvation.

Yes, it is the power of God that brings about salvation. I fully believe that. Yes, I agree that when Paul talks about the natural man, he is comparing the saved, spiritual man, and unsaved, natural man. What have I written that makes you think I meant anything different? My point is that...

You seem not to have answered the fat that Paul not only says that the natural man cannot receive the things of God, but he also cannot even know them. How then can the natural man believe on the Lord Jesus Christ to be saved? Is such a thing not a thing of God?"

But Paul wrote that the natural man can neither receive nor know the things of God. That being so, he is in no position to respond to God and His truth. You say that 1 Corinthians 2:11 will clear things up. As you say, that verse says that "no one knows the thoughts of God except the Spirit...

Yes, I agree, God does not do the responding for the sinner, but He enables the sinner to believe. Again, I agree. We don't know who will be saved and who will not. We are to preach the gospel to all. It does end with something the natural man cannot do: "nor can he know them, because they...

Well, I cannot argue with an American on American politics. :)

Thanks. I always thought that the USA was democratic, in that it holds to government of the people by the people. I came across this at https://www.uscis.gov/sites/default/files/document/lesson-plans/Government_and_You_handouts.pdf "The United States is a representative democracy. This means...

No that is not what I am saying. What I mean is that unsaved sinners, in their sinful nature, have no desire to turn to God, to believe on the only Saviour from sin. These are spiritual truths which we are told the natural (unsaved) man cannot receive: “But the natural man does not receive...