Month: April 2014

New Ark of the Covenant Response (Introduction)

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ark_of_the_covenant

Last week a comment appeared on my post Biblical Mary: The Ark of the New Covenant by a lady named Monica. Here’s what she had to say:

People praying the rosary, singing Mary songs, etc is a form a worship no matter how much catholics want to deny it. These things only belong to God. I have seen pictures of Mary sitting next to God in His throne as she was was co-equal with God when she was only a human like any of us. Of course she was blessed by God and deserves to be honored but it does not imply a godly position. God chose her by His grace, grace is God giving us something we dont deserve.

Why do we need Mary as mediator when Jesus Christ already paid the price for our sins so that we could approach God directly? Saying that we need Mary as mediator is like saying that what Christ did in the cross is worthless or meaningless. Read Luke 23:45 which says that the curtain in the temple was broken apart in two, this symbolizing that the use of mediators (like in the old testament where only the priests could enter the most holy of the holy places and approach God to intercede for people) was terminated.

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Music Monday: Better than a hallelujah

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An appropriate song for Lent, Amy Grant’s “Better than a hallelujah”…

God loves a lulluby
In a mother’s tears in the dead of night
Better than a Hallelujah sometimes

God loves the drunkard’s cry
The soldier’s plea not to let him die
Better than a Hallelujah sometimes

We pour out our miseries
God just hears a melody
Beautiful, the mess we are
The honest cries of breaking hearts
Are better than a Hallelujah

The woman holding on for life
The dying man giving up the fight
Are better than a Hallelujah sometimes

The tears of shame for what’s been done
The silence when the words won’t come
Are better than a Hallelujah sometimes

We pour out our miseries
God just hears a melody
Beautiful the mess we are
The honest cries of breaking hearts
Are better than a Hallelujah

Better than a church bell ringing
Better than a choir singing out, singing out

Blessed are the Gifts

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A couple of days ago on Facebook, my friend Rachel referred to the “seven gifts of the Spirit”. These are the gifts mentioned in the Prophet Isaiah:

And the Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him,
    the spirit of wisdom and understanding,
    the spirit of counsel [right judgement] and might [fortitude],
    the spirit of knowledge and the fear of the Lord.
And his delight shall be in the fear of the Lord [piety]…

– Isaiah 11:2-3

I commented briefly on Rachel’s Facebook posting, saying that St. Augustine associated these seven gifts with Christ’s beatitudes in the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5:3-10). In today’s post I wanted to explain in a little more detail what St. Augustine taught about the relationship between these gifts and the beatitudes…

Sermon on the Mount Copenhagen Church Alter Painting
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