You can make the rocks cry out,Who am I?Before Your might the Behemoth and the Leviathan shudder, Who am I?You swing stars into their place and know the trillions of trillions by their names,What am I?I repent in dust and ashes and submit my heart unquestioningly to You,Still, my Lord I always belong to You...
Secrets of Spiritual Strength (2 Tim. 2:1-6)
Text: 2 Timothy 2:1-6 Sanjaynagar, Feb 20, 20111. Strength in the Grace of the Lord Jesus Christ (v 1)We can only be strong in His grace.We can always approach His throne of grace in prayer (Heb 4:16)Grace upon grace. (Jn 1:16)But, grace is only given to the humble (James 4:6).2. Strength through Sharing God's Blessings (v 2)You only get strong in the thing you share with othersExample: Teachers know better the subject than those who just pass the class and never keep teaching the subject.A stagnant pool gets dirty soon.Sharing reinforces teachingShare...
How One Can Know the Truth (2 Timothy 3)
Text: 2Timothy 3Essentialities of Truth Perception1. Moral Commitment to Pursuit of Truth (vv. 1-5).In the last days, the decrease in the will-to-truth will occur by the increase of love for pleasure and a rebellion against absolutes. Atheism is a mind-set that can't hang on to absolutes and attempts all escapism from the truth of God. It is a moral problem, not a theological one. Those who wish to follow truth must make a commitment to obey it no matter what the consequences would appear to be. Only the ardent seeker will find.2. Critical Mind-set...
Clear the Sky!
Shadows, these dark clouds,They block the light -- it's hard!Rainwater, running all over,It blurs the vision -- can't ride!What current now runs through my being --I wish to think, to write, but the mind's veiled!Holy Spirit, God of cloud and rain!Draw Your scepter, clear the sky,Let the faultless dove now fly!Save Your servantFrom the onslaught of influence!Save Your bondslaveFrom the bondage of shame!May Your kindness guide me through these storms,And bring You glory through these clouds and this rain!© Domenic Marbaniang, February 13, 2...
Winning through Discipline and Diligence
I remember a story by Leo Tolstoy in which the devil wishes to deceive and lure Ivan the Fool. After failing many attempts to lure him, he finally proposes to teach Ivan and all the fools how to do brain-work. He says that they who work with the mind can do better than they that work with the hands. This interests Ivan the Fool who remarks that he wanted to learn how to work with the head so that it'll help when they're tired working with the hands. So, the fools gather around the devil who ascends to a tower and begins his lectures on how to work...
Rational Fideism
by Domenic Marbaniang [1]There are three chief epistemological approaches to the study of God, namely, the rational approach, the empirical approach, and the revelational or Sabdic approach. Neither the rational approach nor the empirical approach is theologically effective; it is only through a subjective urge of faith and a rational fideistic appropriation of revelation that one can ever come to know God.The rationalist tradition only leads to a monistic view of divine reality. This is so because with the expulsion of empirical categories, reason...
Conformity Appeal
Modernization, contextualization, and indigenization are all good words with proper intention of appeal through being relevant.However, when this is stretched to the point of conformity to the other group's ideals, one lands into danger.1. It is easy to pull someone down than to pull someone up.2. It may be necessary for you to bend as far as possible in order to reach out and grasp the one in need of help. But, don't bend so far that you lose your balance and fall into the pit yourself.3. If one conforms to another's ideals, the point of difference...
The Search for Reality in Greek and Indian Philosophy
From Epistemics of Divine Reality, 2nd Edn. (2010) by Domenic Marbaniang, pp.92,93While for the Greeks physical reality was a major concern, for the Indians conscious reality was the major concern. While the Greeks tried to find what the unifying basis of all physical reality was as such, the Indians wanted to find what the unifying basis of all conscious reality was as such. The Greeks began from physics and proceeded on to metaphysics. The Indians began from the self, from consciousness, and proceeded on to metaphysics. The Greeks tried to analyze...
Women as Ministers
I commend to you Phoebe our sister, who is a servant of the church in Cenchrea, that you may receive her in the Lord in a manner worthy of the saints, and assist her in whatever business she has need of you; for indeed she has been a helper of many and of myself also. (Rom 16:1-2)Paul referred to Phoebe as a servant (diakonos), a deacon and minister of the church in Cenchrea. The term diakonos in the New Testament is used for people in governmental authority (Rom 13:4), for the apostolic ministry of Paul (Eph 3:7, Col 1:23), for a servant-attitude...
Self-Control - An Essential Qualification of God's Servant
A man of God should possess a disciplined life-style (rising early, keeping things tidy, eating moderately, talking sparingly and wisely, behaving modestly, studying purposefully, avoiding all appearance of evil, pursuing excellence with all diligence). He should bear self-control. He should also first be a good leader in his own home before he could be qualified to lead the family of God.But I discipline my body and bring it into subjection, lest, when I have preached to others, I myself should become disqualified. (1Co 9:27)A man without self-control...
A Dialogue on Trinity - III
IIIcontinued from “A Dialogue on Trinity-II” Madeleine: Then, when did this become a problem?Clarke: It became a serious problem some 300 years after Christ, when a certain presbyter named Arius began teaching that Jesus was not God but the first creation of God. God created Jesus first; then, all other things through him, he said. Many preachers did oppose him and a Council was called at Nicaea in 325 AD, in which, after rigorous debates from both...
How Could An Innocent Man Die for the Sins of the World?
The Scandal of Particularity questions how one Man could be God and also be the Savior of the whole world. There are two pictures in the Bible that answer this:1. Surety. Jesus Christ is made the surety of the New Covenant by which participants in the Covenant share in the blessings of the Covenant (Hebrews 7:22). Now, a surety is someone who provides a warrant or guarantee for an other. If I wish to borrow Rs.5000/- from a creditor, and he doesn't trust me, he would ask for a guarantor or surety, who answers to him and is willing to pay in case...
The Sixth-Fifth Century BC in the Theology of History
Proceeding from a Christo-centric view of History as a linear and purposeful succession of events that are centered around the Revelation of Jesus Christ and the consummation of all things in Him, we also observe that the 6th-5th c. B.C. had a significant role to play in the development of the preparatio evangelica towards the advent of Christ. This period of world-history was characterized by reform movements worldwide.Middle-East:The Babylonian...
What is the Church?
But ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, an holy nation, a peculiar people; that ye should shew forth the praises of him who hath called you out of darkness into his marvellous light.. (1 Pet. 2:9)The English word "Church" comes from the Greek Kyriakon meaning "of the Lord". The term used in the New Testament, however, is ekklesia (formed of ek, "out", and kaleo, "called"), meaning the "called out". Peter refers to the Church as not a...
