It's Friday. You need a chuckle.
This is not brand-new, but it's awfully and ouchily good. You'll laugh, you'll wince, you'll pass it along. I'm not sure the writer and I are on the exact same side on every particular... but yikes, it's good (H-T Paleoevangelical.)
Here are a few excerpts (but you should read the whole):
1. Q: What is the chief end of each individual Christian?
A: Each individual Christian's chief end is to get saved. This is the first and great commandment.
2. Q: And what is the second great commandment?
A: The second, which is like unto it, is to get as many others saved as he can.
3. Q: What one work is required of thee for thy salvation?
A: It is required of me for my salvation that I make a Decision for Christ, which meaneth to
accept Him into my heart to be my personal lord'n'saviour...6. Q: By what means is a Decision for Christ made?
A: A Decision for Christ is made, not according to His own purpose and grace which was given to me in Christ Jesus before the world began, but according to the exercise of my own Free Will in saying the Sinner's Prayer in my own words.
7. Q: If it be true then that man is responsible for this Decision, how then can God be sovereign?
A: He cannot be. God sovereignly chose not to be sovereign, and is therefore dependent upon me to come to Him for salvation. He standeth outside the door of my heart, forlornly knocking, until such time as I Decide to let Him in.
8. Q: How then can we make such a Decision, seeing that the Scripture saith, we are dead in our trespasses and sins?
A: By this the Scripture meaneth, not that we are dead, but only that we are sick or injured in them.
9. Q: What is the assurance of thy salvation?
A: The assurance of thy salvation is, that I know the date on which I prayed the Sinner's Prayer, and have duly written this date on an official Decision card.
...10. Q: What is thy story? What is thy song?
A: Praising my Savior all the day long.
11. Q: You ask me how I know he lives?
A: He lives within my heart.
12. Q: And what else hast thou got in thine heart?
A: I've got the joy, joy, joy, joy down in my heart.
13. Q: Where??
A: Down in my heart!
14. Q: Where???
A: Down in my heart!!
He shot, he scored.
37 comments:
Oh, this is a rather diabolical slice of satire... it is satire, right? Right?!
Questions 12-14 were absolutely hilarious!!! I read the whole thing on the link you gave, and it got kinda tiresome after a while, but the funniest ones were the song quotes. That's why I liked 12-14 so much.
The earlier version of this categchism (1991) staes as the answer to #8:
By this the Scripture meaneth, not that we are dead, but tis but a scratch.
There was a lot of legal rancor around that phrasing, so they changed it to what we have today.
(C) 2006, Wikicclesia/Communio Sanctorum, all rights reserved.
Is this teaching aid available on BibleWorks 7?
LOL, Jeremy. WCF is... hm, maybe a user-created add-on?
Thanks for the chuckle.
"I got the peace that passes understanding, down in my heart, where? down in my heart, where? down in my heart- to stayyyyy. And I'm so happy, so very happy...."
Thanks I'll be singing that all day long now.lol
"Is this teaching aid available on BibleWorks 7?"
No, but the guys at e-sword.net may put it up in a future module.
Hi-LAR-ious, but quite sad. And true, depending upon the region of the country where you live.
From the full article, I particularly enjoyed this one:
32. Q: What is baptism?
A: Baptism is the act whereby, by the performance of something that seems quite silly in front of everyone, I prove that I really, really mean it.
Very sharp.
Perhaps we can also add:
Q. What hath God said unto Noah?
A. There's going to be a floody-floody.
"ouchily good"
I love that. And I loved this post .
Thanks. It's great humor with a point.
LOL, John.
Leading inevitably to....
Q. What spake the Lord unto Noah?
A. "Get those animals out of the muddy-muddy."
Here's my Arminian version of "Blessed Assurance."
Not much assurance, maybe He's mine..
Maybe I'll make it to heaven sometime.
Watching and waiting, wringing my hands..
never quite sure of just where I stand.
This is my story, this is my song..
quaking in terror all the day long..
This is my story, this is my song..
quaking in terror all the day long.
Undeniably humorous, but I can't escape the conviction there will probably be some zealous but unlearned Arminians in heaven who will be 'first', and some coldly orthodox Calvinists who know their Westminster backwards and forwards, who will be 'last' ...
solameanie -- that's too good.
Did you ever see "Arminian Grace"?
http://bibchr.blogspot.com/2006/02/arminian-grace.html
(Does anyone know how to do links in these comment boxes?!)
Funny, but why is it that Dispensational Premillennianism gets lumped together with all of that other Arminian crud and easy believism?
That sounds really whiny, i know. But darn it (said while stomping my foot) I'm flustered!
Jeff -- I hear ya. Like I said, I don't think he and I see eye to eye on everything. Painting all dispies with the same brush is just as fair as lumping all amills with Harold Camping.
Um, Tereo-Kensai, you may have a point but... no-sense-of-humor, much?
I read the rest of the list from the link you gave. Today is baaaad day, but this gave me a chuckle.
I'm picturing you, in a theater, watching The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, and suddenly you leap to your feet and thunder, "Well, that's stupid -- lions don't talk! And besides, fauns are Roman mythology, which is paganism -- which is SIN!!!"
Popcorn flies, seats empty, reformed Baptists trampled in the aisle....
If, as you suggest, this happens a lot, it mightn't necessarily be the hearers.
DJP said: (Does anyone know how to do links in these comment boxes?!)
I do.
You type in the html for a link:
In order to link to http://bibchr.blogspot.com/2006/02/arminian-grace.html you would type in:
<a href="http://bibchr.blogspot.com/2006/02/arminian-grace.html"> click here </a>
and it would look like this when you post it:
click here
Regards (the other Dan)
OK, Daniel, so where it differs from your usual, garden-variety hperlink is that you put spaces fore-n-aft? Cool; I can do that!
Thanks!
On Narnia, looks like I saw it about the same as you .
It's a humor piece. I'm a self-described Calvidispiebaptogelical, so, as I've said (and said and said), he and I don't see eye to eye on everything.
So I shrug that off, and enjoy the rest. If I had to agree with every part of everything, I'd have one barren, largely self-published library.
excellent way to reveal true differences in how people think as they pproach the Father "through" Christ. Thankfully growth in grace and knowledge takes place in the life of God's children.
DJP - you would be a practicing Arthur Pink. IMO
tereo-kensai:
I've seen a similar piece that makes fun of the Presbyterians. I'll try and find it for you.
tereo -- here's maybe a better and briefer answer.
If the shoe don't fit, I don't wear it.
So if that parody is meant to slam me, but the slams are false, I shrug them off.
Now, if he stands there pointing at me and screaming 'Your shoes! Yours! Put them on!", then we might have a situation.
As it is, he can think what he wants, and I can think it was funny.
(Mm. Not much briefer, was it?)
t-k, you need to lighten up and get some looser shorts or something. No one's trying to start a theological war here. It's *humor*, and everyone oughta be able to laugh at themselves occasionally. Even the EC guys are able to do that...a lot of the ECers got a laugh out of this one, and the Presbyterians (of which I am one) can chuckle at this one.
Take a deep breath and relax, dude.
An oldy but a goody...
Hilarious stuff! Thanks for the laugh.
Dan,
Thanks for the laugh. Some of them were painful and brought up bad memories of being a fundy. But overall, I laughed my six off.
-Mike
I love this . Very funny.
"Where?? Down in my heart!
Where??? Down in my heart!!
And if the devil doesn't like he can sit on a tack! What's up with that?
The whole transcript is something to hold on to. Very clever.
Thanks again for sharing it.
Solameanie, You hilariously destroyed that song.
Tereo... learn to laugh and stop the preaching. This was funny.
^^^Amen!
Thanks to those who appreciated my humor.
Now, all kidding aside..I am a former Arminian. The doctrines of grace were very hard for me to accept at the beginning as they appeared unjust to my finite human mind. In the end, I couldn't dance around Romans 9. Then all the other pieces began falling into place by God's grace.
I truly believe spiritual pride lies at the root of it all. We just can't stand it that there is nothing we can do to contribute to our salvation. Calvinist (I hate to use that label..I prefer biblical) doctrines are so devastating to human pride.
The long and short of it is that God - and God alone - saves us. We contribute nothing. The changed heart, the changed mind, the changed life..all are products of God's sovereign work in the lives of His children. The moment we begin thinking that we do something to contribute to - or merit - our salvation is basically tantamount to spitting in the Lord's face. What He did on the cross wasn't good enough. It's not phrased in those words, but it might as well be. I think that's why some of on the Calvinist side of the fence get as irritated as we do at times.
I do not save me. He saves me. I do not keep myself saved. He keeps me saved. He gets all the glory for it. Period. That is where the "peace that passes understanding" comes in. What a relief and what a joy salvation in Christ is! Anticipating the counter as the Apostle Paul did..I do not believe one can just "sin it up" and think nothing of it. A truly born again believer would not think or act in such a way. We keep God's commandments because we love Him, and we love Him because He first loved us. I now know that God is perfectly just in all He does. The miracle isn't that He chooses to save some. The miracle is that He chooses to save anybody.
Harruuumph!
¡sbgtfa!
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