Reasons To Believe : Q&A: Four Rivers and the Location of Eden.
By Hugh Ross
Do you dare to accept the fact that the sovereign God had designed to do all of His work through spiritually-gifted men and women? Therefore, He does all of His work on earth through humble and faithful believers who are given spiritual gifts and abilities beyond their own capacities.
Let me shock you at this point: A naturally bright person can carry on religious activity without a special gift from God. Filling church pulpits every week are some who are using only natural abilities and special training. Some are known as Bible expositors, for it is possible to read and study commentaries and then repeat what has been learned about the Scriptures.
Yes, it may shock you, but it is true that anyone able to talk fluently can learn to use religious phrases and can become recognized as a preacher.
But if any man is determined to preach so that his work and ministry will abide in the day of the judgement fire, then he must preach, teach and exhort with the kind of love and concern that comes only through a true and genuine gift of the Holy Spirit–something beyond his own capabilities!
A.W. Tozer; Gifts of the Spirit: Necessity in the Church, Chapter 7; The Tozer Pulpit, Vol.7 p.89; 1978 Christian Publications Inc.
I used to think that Christians were ignorant to believe the “stories” in the Bible. I was taught those stories as a child, but I grew up to “know” they weren’t true. Or did I?
My investigation into the claims of theists about the existence of God and Christians about the existence of God’s Son led me into a study of archaeology in 1971. I was especially interested in archaeological expeditions from the Middle East because much of the Old Testament was written in and about that area of the world. I was a bit surprised to discover that many archaeological findings pointed to the “possibility” that people written about in the Old Testament may have actually lived at the time the writers claimed.
But what about the claim that a small family left Canaan, entered Egypt, grew to great numbers, were forced into slavery, then were freed from slavery…
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Greece’s last Romaniote Jews remember a catastrophe – Jewish World Features Israel News | Haaretz.
On March 25, 1944, the German Nazi occupiers rounded up the Jews of Ioannina. As snow fell, they were put into open trucks and taken to a nearby city. From there, a nine-day rail journey took them to Auschwitz.
The names of the town’s 1,832 Jews who were murdered are carved on marble tablets on the walls of the synagogue. Among the dead were more than 500 children under the age of 13.
Only 112 Ioannina Jews survived the death camps. Another 69 escaped the roundup, hiding with Christian families or fleeing into the mountains, where some fought with the Greek resistance. When they returned to Ioannina, many found their properties looted and homes occupied.
But it was not just the people who were wiped out. Centuries of tradition disappeared, too.