Jonathan Edwards on why fallen angels got no Covenant of Grace

296. DEVILS.

'Tis probable, one reason why man has the offer of a Savior and the devils never had, was because their sin was attended with that malice and spite and haughty scornfulness, that was equivalent to the sin against the Holy Ghost. Their sin was a downright spiteful rebellion and a direct malicious war against God, a scorn of subjection and a proud seeking of his throne. - Jonathan Edwards Miscellanies

Link

The Bible alone

[What I'm saying in this post is there are no short cuts with the Bible. The Holy Spirit rewards dedicated reading, complete reading of the Bible. He rewards it with real understanding. This is how a street Christian like John Bunyan can impress an honest, mature, highly educated Christian like John Owen. I see seminary types making exhaustive lists of commentaries for each book of the Bible like that is how you get real understanding of the word of God, but it is the actual living language of the Bible that has to be engaged to get the deep understanding that is parts in relation to the whole and beyond the surface level where dictionaries and commentaries and outlines reside.]

I've always found that commentaries on the Bible don't help much. They can help to understand a difficultly worded verse or passage, but they don't give deep understanding. They are surface level. Also, outlines of Bible chapters and books. They don't really help much in gaining deep understanding. They are eye candy when the effort to engage the actual words of the Bible is unwanted effort.

Similar Bible helps are the same.

It seems the Spirit really only rewards direct and dedicated reading of the Bible. Complete readings in particular.

An exception seems to be systematic theology. Of course I mean on-the-mark systematic theology (once one has the raw material of the Bible in one from complete reading.) Reformed Theology being the gold standard there. Reformed Theology says what the Bible says. With rare quibbles in sacramentology and ecclesiology. For the most part. Systematic theology seems to have the energy of the Spirit in it.

The most powerful means, though, of getting deep understanding of the Bible is direct meditating and pondering, away from the page, which can only be done by being able to draw verses and passages into mind from memory. This not only enables one to see what the Bible is saying closely, especially in relation to our experience and state, but it engrafts the word of God into us essentially.

I was doing this with Psalm 38 and was seeing worlds of things I would pass over if just reading the text in the usual breezy manner. By pausing, memorizing, turning from the page and bringing up verses on my own into mind I could see how seemingly similar verses actually were relating different psychological and emotional phenomena - and describing real experience - and drawing different realizations out of me (all the myriad things the words of the Bible do). I could also see how verse 18 of that psalm was the central verse. A usual run-through reading would not have seen that.

In this post I have used words that the legions of shallow pastors and theologians would stupidly grin at. Bible *alone.* Seeing my own *states* and *experience* in the words. For some of them even the notion of reading the Bible complete draws 'concern' from their idiot minds. Indoctrinated in shallow, culturally Marxist seminaries. Engaging the word of God in real, deep ways will always be seen as 'dangerous' by the dead souls of establishment Christianity. They see themselves as necessary mediators between God and man (and Bible and man). They know nothing of spiritual warfare. They can't discern the spiritual battlefield. They practically deny the Holy Spirit Himself. They are shallow and operating under the authority of demons.

The pastors and theologians need to come out of that devil-run system.

Con-sssede, they hiss

As a KJV Onlyist when I hear people assailing my belief I hear:

"Concede there is error in your Bible. Concede now!!"

What does that sound like? It sounds like:

"Yea, hath God said...?" (Genesis 3:1)

Practical Christianity...seeing it

[If you're going to stop reading this in the middle of the post at least skim each paragraph. There is new subject matter in each paragraph. From 2013.]

The Catholic Church is a communion in the spiritual realm that gives no defense against the Devil.

Classical Reformation era Protestantism, as a whole, is a sound fortress in the spiritual realm. It exists as this as something that is not necessarily attached to local communions. Classical Reformation era Protestantism as a whole.

Eastern Orthodox Christianity is pious in some good ways but vulnerable on the spiritual battlefield due to doctrinal ignorance and an acceptance of doctrinal ignorance.

Biblical doctrine is armor of God. This is how it is practical. It is actual armor on the spiritual battlefield. Hard saying, unwatered down, unnegotiated down to the demands of our fallen nature biblical doctrine when seen and accepted and valued changes you internally. It reorientates you. For instance it makes you God centered rather than man centered. Without real biblical doctrine you are naked on the spiritual battlefield. If you don't know what real biblical doctrine is yet then move towards what your fallen nature hates the most. (Yes, real biblical doctrine is five solas, doctrines of grace Calvinism...classical Covenant - Federal - Theology.) Use the same method to find the pure and whole word of God (it is the received Hebrew and Greek text underlying the Authorized - King James - Version, in any sound translation, but notice there's only one available widely today, which is telling).

The use of the Law for a regenerated Christian is for necessary friction for inner spiritual development (progressive sanctification). The friction comes not just from the Law in it's pure form (there is less friction there for a regenerated Christian because a regenerated Christian can follow the law and wants to follow the law [not meaning can be perfect, but is able to sin, able to not sin]), but also from the Law in its twisted, distorted form. The Devil and his fallen angels, the world (including other human beings), and our inner fallen nature twist the Law of God and distort it to make it a mass of accusation and shaming and policing in the service of maintaining the elements of Devil's Kingdom here in this world. After the Fall, the pure Law of God came into the hands of the Devil, the world, and our inner fallen nature...mass fallen humanity, and has been twisted and distorted and turned into a works righteousness as defined by the Devil...with the Devil's goals in mind. This twisted, distorted aspect of God's Law is like a massive black monstrous presence in this world working to keep individuals in their place (in the Devil's Kingdom) and working to feed the Devil's Kingdom with suffering and death. To see it in full manifestation study the hell of the totalitarian regimes of the 20th century. Remember, the mass effecting of this twisted, distorted form of God's Law is acted out by fallen human beings who act with a piousness and Pharisee-like self-righteousness and sense of being holy that are also distorted aspects of real biblical faith. Of course the Beast and the False Prophet, in their different manifestations, are the objects (idols) of their worship in all this, whether as a totalitarian state, the planet, multi-culturalism, media, entertainment, education, etc.. Seeing all this as God's Law (twisted and distorted) brings you to the practical level of seeing something as big in the faith as the Law in a clear way.

The Gospel is regeneration, justification, repentance, faith, definitive sanctification, adoption, glorification. All that is connection. It's not 'being good.' It is connection. Effected by God. To use a biblical metaphor you *were* a fish, living in a wholly different cosmos (the ocean, or "sea" as the language of biblical prophecy prefers sometimes, and see how 'sea' is not a good thing?). Then you were 'hooked' and drawn up out of that cosmos into a wholly different cosmos, where you exist now (I speak to regenerated believers). So, practically speaking, the 'connection' you have in the Gospel is with a wholly different cosmos you are now living in (your very life force comes from another source, the living water Jesus speaks of). Notice you're a bit out-of-step with your environment? Other people? Alienated? At odds? It's because you are not even in the same cosmos they are living in. You are even in another realm of time.

Unspoken tension breaks forth into words between moderators at the Puritanboard

[This is from 2013, yet still relevant.]

An interesting thread at the Puritanboard (here, mostly on page 4, assuming they don't delete comments after I've written this) evolved into some real conflict between moderators. One of the King James Version advocates, Rev. Winzer, was accused of being a default King James Onlyist and then others piled on Winzer, including another moderator (or administrator, one of the two).

Basically, the people who have championed the garbage manuscripts (Sinaiticus and Vaticanus) and the modern versions based on them are conscience-struck whenever they are in the presence of someone like Winzer because they know they are rejecting the pure and whole word of God for versions they can look down on rather than have to look up to. So ultimately they have to take a position of eliminating the KJV and its advocates from their environment. Ultimately.

And this necessity has erupted in one of the threads over there in recent days. Like atheists, like anybody in the Devil's camp, they ultimately can't accept co-existence with the pure and whole word of God and all who hold to it. They have to eliminate the pure and whole word of God and any who hold to it. It is part and parcel of the Devil and his children asserting dominion over the entire planet just before the day of the Lord consummation.

So their first move is like any atheist move which is to demand a 'concession' from the evil child of God.

Well, Winzer refused to make any such concession and demanded a retraction of what his accuser said of him. This was not forthcoming as I write this.

To the champions of the garbage manuscripts and the perversions based on them, here is a clue: if you are the stung party, it's pretty good evidence you are on the wrong side of the divide.

The legal justification for Europeans conquering America

This is an interesting passage in a book on American history that goes into the actual thought at the time, or legal justification, for the European taking of lands away from the native Americans. It's not usually thought that there was any legal thought going on about it vis-a-vis the native inhabitants. The relations between the settlers or colonists or traders and their home country, yes; but not the conquerors vs. conquered. That just seemed to be chalked up to the ways of the world. Here it is:

What of lands already occupied, for instance by Native Americans? That question inspired the fourth spirit of English colonization, the racial and legal one. It held simply that the rights of savage or indigent peoples were forfeit. The English first applied that principle in Ireland, the colonial laboratory where they learned contempt and fear for uncivilized neighbors and asserted eminent domain over unimproved lands. John Locke justified that right in his Second Treatise of Government in 1689. He began by asserting, “In the beginning all the world was America,” by which he meant undeveloped, and ended by asserting that American Indians “exercise very little Dominion, and have but a very moderate sovereignty.” In short, the English believed the displacement of indolent people by dynamic civilizers was not only inevitable but just.

That's from Throes of Democracy by Walter A. McDougall.

The full-belly idiocy of the elites

One of the big themes of the 20th century (and going into the 21st) is how elites ignorantly take civilization for granted. Call it the full-belly idiocy of the elites.

They're living in total comfort and prosperity, fed and protected by average Americans they look down on (that is, those elites who don't think food grows in grocery stores and defense of the nation is reliant upon their kindness and understanding of other countries).

So they're bored, of course. And they carp and complain. Things just aren't as they require them to be ever. Then their growing stupidity becomes prey to the various Satanic ideologies and tactics of culture destruction out in the world.

They need the sharp side of a shovel sliced into their necks. It's hard to imagine more shallow and worthless souls. Just the fact that they self-identify as 'elite' when they're not and they've never been elite at anything. They couldn't change a flat tire if you put a gun to their head. They don't create anything, build anything, invent anything, discover anything, grow anything, fix anything, or even creatively destroy anything. They're the worst of the worst. Born in liberty and prosperity and they wake up every morning scheming with all the limited brain power they possess to bring the country down to tyranny and darkness.

It's often said there is a cycle where there is a generation, or multiple generations of mature men and women who, through necessity, build and create and fight and defend civilization, and then inevitably they produce subsequent generations who piss it all away in ignorance and weakness and idle, shallow decadence. I don't see the landscape as it is now as being part of that cycle. That cycle never hits rock bottom like things have today. What is happening today is God's elect are becoming more and more rare. Less and less of them are being born. More and more worthless reprobate souls are appearing on the scene. End times Satanic moves have been quickening as a result. When Satan is able to fool the nations to the extent that he can assert dominion over the entire planet we are seeing the end.

God's elect, Christians, Bible-believing Christians, are suppose to confront Satan in all this though. Stand ground, occupy ground. That tempers us, sanctifies us, and calls out the few elect not yet called. All the while saying to God: please get us off this idiotic ride...

Jerusalem to Athens to Rome to London to Philadelphia

[From an email...]

Steve Bannon is quoted in a new bio:

America has “an underlying culture, that has been passed down from Jerusalem, to Athens, to Rome, to London.

I recently wrote that post on 5 cities history (including Washington - or more symbolically, Philadelphia - at the end of that river of influence through time). Bannon is in sync with how I think (and no doubt millions of others in this country). He also was greatly influenced by Gibbon's Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, Plutarch, and Thucydides. All books on my 12 [or 16] book list. Other books he cites as major influences are Catholic oriented: Imitation of Christ (OK, not exclusively Catholic), Loyola, etc.

Objective understanding

[From 2011 on my Fourth Way blog.]

It's a big deal getting understanding of biblical doctrine. Seeing it, accepting it, valuing it. It builds your spiritual body. The same with getting parts in relation to the whole understanding of the word of God. It's unusual. As I'm here reading endless chapters of the Old Testament I sometimes think how unusual it is compared to what is happening everywhere else all around me. Not that I'm special, just how different it is.


You have to engage this living language of the Old and New Testaments until it fuses into something higher, until you see it as truly universal, until its seeming provincial, localized aspects fall away. Then it becomes true objective understanding. There's nothing under the sun (or beyond the sun) within time, or in eternity, that can't be understood by it (other than God, completely).


In the above I am assuming Man #4 type efforts and development into Man #5.

Where anger has no point (second conscious shock)

[This is from 2013 on another blog. It has Fourth Way (Ouspensky) language in it, but it still has value for a church level Christian. There is church level and there is order level. One need not be interested in or drawn toward the order level to be saved.]

I've been reading The King in His Beauty by Thomas R. Schreiner, and it is scattershot, but it keeps pulling me back in. Here is a quote from the chapter on Psalms that I found very interesting:

* * * * * * *

As Gerald Wilson points out, even in the shape of the Psalter there is a movement from lament to praise, so that laments are more common in the first part of the Psalter, and praise concludes it. “Praise,” Wilson says, “constitutes another reality in which the presence of God has become so real that anger has no point, pain has no hold, and death lacks all power to sting.”

Schreiner, Thomas R. (2013-07-15). King in His Beauty, The: A Biblical Theology of the Old and New Testaments (p. 250). Baker Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.

* * * * * * *

I think that language is unusual. "Praise constitutes another reality." Then this: "...in which the presence of God has become so real that *anger has no point*..."

That's what I was getting at with resentment. I was saying it this way: "What is the goal of our resentment? To what end?" Concluding that the only end is the ludicrous end of burning down the world, which is hell itself.

Where anger has no point. That's a state of being. A level of being to be reached.

______________________________________________

In other words:

"...in which the presence of God has become so real..." (First Conscious Shock)

"...that anger has no point..." (Second Conscious Shock)

Which would make 'praise' (which he calls another reality) akin to the third and fourth state of consciousness. It's interesting anyway that 'praise' goes from being an activity to being a destination. A place.

-------------------------------------------------

! ! ! ! ! ! !

It is striking how that phrase - "where anger has no point" - captures the second conscious shock in a deep and newly-articulated way.

First principles of nationhood

Without these a nation is not a nation:

1. Familial ties

2. A common language

3. A common national epic

4. A common faith

[Adapted from a Michael Walsh article.]

Thought, after sickness...

[an old post from another blog, as are the three others below this]

After awhile, once you get to the core of orthodox
Christianity, you see it really is rather esoteric in
nature. A 3 in 1, 1 in 3 God; a new birth experience
that has catch-22s all over it (I didn't do it, God
does it; yet part of God doing it is me moving in that
direction in all the various ways that happens, etc.);
a new birth experience that requires an inner
reorientation from self-will to real will, going from
acting bottom-up to acting top-down, and how that is
not 'effort' yet it is effort of a kind, etc., etc.

The big panorama behind it all can be acquired from
the theologians. The covenant theologians. Federal
theology. The covenant of redemption and works and
grace. The four states of man. The fall and
reconnection by faith and return, etc. 

But the teaching of Christ itself having to do with
sanctification, or development gets lost. The
theologians are not as adept on that subject. You
have to get that from the Spirit. And language
inspired by the Spirit.

But it can all become dead quickly if you stay within
the mainstream and allow the mainstream to stifle your
development. You have to be light on your feet with
anything to do with the Spirit and spiritual
development. 

And you have to continually go to the Source, the Word
of God, and actually find for yourself what is in
there and put it together. Continually. 

Prayer is an art. If you pray for things, worldly
things, that make your life smooth and comfortable or
that goes against God's will you'll probably be
disappointed in some way. If you pray for things that
have room for maneuvering in realms of higher laws the
art of prayer then becomes more interesting. 

When everybody around me was getting sick with a
vicious virus I prayed to be protected from it. Then
I stuck myself with an infected needle (giving an
elderly person an insulin shot, something I'd never
done before, then carrying the used needle and lancet
- that's used to test blood sugar - I got careless and
pricked my finger; within half a day I had a full dose
of the norovirus). So I did it, God didn't. But
sickness is something we learn from anyway. 
Potentially. A restart. Mentally as well. 

But once you have the big background panoramic picture
that the Bible and biblical doctrine presents, then
just like all the mystics you have to find what it is
you have to hold on to and practice and live by. It's
there in the Bible, and in a language like the Work. 
It's not one thing, most likely, for everybody, but to
find what you need does take effort and valuation and
constant staying on it.

An observation on the classic catechisms (Westminster, Heidelberg, etc.)

Notice when reading one of the classic catechisms such as the Westminster Shorter Catechsim or the Heidelberg Catechism there is a disappointment when you get beyond the doctrinal parts and they close out with rundowns of the Ten Commandments and the Lord's Prayer. There is disappointment because more is expected. What is missing? 

It's in these parts of the catechisms that is elucidated what one actually does as a Christian. Good works. Good works, as the Heidelberg Catechism (or, Ursinus in his Commentary on that catechism) states are works that are commanded by God. So they then discuss the Ten Commanments. Which is proper, but they are leaving out something rather big.

They are leaving out the teaching on good works of Jesus and the apostles in the New Testament. Things like turn the other cheek, and love thy enemy, and practicing watchfulness, and separating yourself unto the Gospel (and away from the world), and fearing God only, and wait on the Lord, &c. All of which can be seen, or culled by implication from the Ten Commandments, but they are not explicitly stated in them which is why Jesus spoke the words he spoke in the New Testament. And they aren't all summed up, either, in the Lord's Prayer, anymore than the Sermon on the Mount is summed up in the Lord's Prayer. 

It's a strange missing element from these great, classic catechisms.

It's because the teaching of Jesus is of a different level and stage. To value the teaching of Jesus (to even see it) requires true regeneration effected by the Word and the Spirit. Narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it. Now it is high time to awake out of sleep...

Two-Register Cosmology

"Two-Register Cosmology: Central in biblical revelation is the relationship of God, whose dwelling place is heaven's glory (Ps 115:16), to man on earth. A two-register cosmos is thus the scene of the biblical drama, which features constant interaction between the upper and lower registers.[3]" 

"[3]Theological differences aside, the cosmology of mythology is analogous. Indeed, mythology may be defined formally precisely as a portrayal of human affairs in terms of a dynamic interrelating of divine and human realms." 

Excerpt and footnote from Kline's article 'Space and Time in the Genesis Cosmogony' included as Appendix A in his book God, Heaven and Har Magedon, pg. 224, Wipf & Stock Publishers, 2006

Practical mystic

Quote I found (you have to read the whole thing):

'This brings me to the supremest and most solid truth contained in the Science of prayer. The praying mind, by its mere attitude of faith and earnest expectation, opens itself out to the tremendous inflow of Divine Energy. It draws close to the centre of all-power, wisdom and love, and drinks deep of the living waters of life so that even the very face or flesh begins to shine under the influence of this self-polarization — if I may be permitted to use this word — through prayer. Here is the causa nuxus between a prayer and its sure reply. Do you remember what Lord Rosebery said of the great Puritan Mystic Oliver Cromwell? If not, please let me quote: “The secret of his extraordinary success — he was a practical mystic — the most formidable and terrible of all combinations. The man who combines inspiration, apparently derived — in my judgment, really derived — from close communion with the Supernatural and the Celestial, a man who has that inspiration and adds to it the energy of a mighty man of action, such a man as that lives in communion on a Sinai of his own; and when he pleases to come down to this world below, seems armed with no less than the terrors and decrees of the Almighty Himself.”'

http://www.aksworld.com/blog/2006/07/20/a-study-in-mystic-concentration/

Not a Christian site, but interesting nonetheless. Calling Cromwell a 'Puritan mystic' is interesting in itself.

This 3-part article in the American Spectator concisely and clearly describes the competing interests in America today

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

A reminder to make yourselves constantly familiar with the Rich Higgins Memo

It's rare when something is as powerfully on-the-mark as the memo Rich Higgins drew up before getting fired from his executive branch job by one of President Trump's worst hires, General McMaster. And that it is succinct and to-the-point just adds to its value.

Here it is.

Read it periodically as things unfold. Do research on parts of it that are new to you. Never heard of the Frankfurt School? Look it up. Don't know who Antonio Gramsci was or what he taught? Make an effort to learn. Get to know these tactics of the enemy. They are Satan's army. All these tactics they engage in will convict them at the Great White Throne Judgment. I would go so far to say they are the reprobates. They have the stench of hell fire on them. They've used these same tactics elsewhere in the world to murder scores of millions and to hold under their boot of tyranny hundreds of millions more.

This is the stark spiritual battlefield. Acquire the full armor of God (Ephesians 6:10-18), and learn the tactics of the enemy.

Message to some for whom the shoe fits

It's a powerful force inside people to turn away from the reality of evil so as not to have to be awake and be conscious of evil to begin with. When the people who do that self-identify as Christian they need to question themselves whether they believe in the supernatural and in evil and sin to begin with. If you don't, you're not a Christian. You're a nominal Christian. Something akin to a practical atheist or a practical deist.

Yes, it's very depressing to wake up to the evil of this fallen world. Including our own sinful fallen nature. It's like waking up to the realization you're in a prison full of violent lunatics. Not a happy situation. Not a blue skies and flowers and puppies situation. But the reality of our situation is what it is. There's a reason the Bible tells us we need the full armor of God.

When you mock people who are awake and speak or write about it you play into Satan's hands. If you want a clear example of that study how the mass Satanic front religion called Islam infiltrates societies, mocking anybody who is awake to them and tells the truth about them. This is how Satan operates. "We are a religion of peace. Why are you a bigot towards us? Why are you acting crazy? We believe in the brotherhood of man. Everybody is equal..." That's where they are currently in America. In England, where they sense they now have the upper hand, it is suddenly, "Behead anybody who insults Islam! We will rape your daughters and kill you if you confront us!"

This is all obvious for people who are awake. And even some of the mockers are able to see an example that's become as obvious as Islam. But to see other forces in society in league with Satan it's a little more difficult for the sleeping crowd. Again, though, I direct this to self-identified Christians. If you mock people who are pointing out the evil around you you probably have not been fully initiated into the faith (read the Bible complete over and over). Many of these people simply lack the background to see what is happening (they lack historical perspective, for instance), but it is more foundational for them that they likely don't yet believe in the supernatural or evil and sin.

An insight on Trump

Reading Trump's Tweets this morning I saw something. The reason he freaks establishment Republicans out so much is he is constantly not giving a f**k about the Satanic spirit in the people who are against us. Everybody else is afraid of that spirit, and think, "No, don't make them angry! They have the holy and dangerous spirit of Satan! They'll hurt us!" Trump is not only not afraid of it all, but he doesn't play the pilgrim politics game of pretending they're friendly to us whenever they throw us a bone and sound reasonable. He's still like, "F**k off, Pocahontas, we know what you're all about."

Pilgrim politics is a phrase from Meredith Kline. It's what the Israelites engaged in when they were surrounded by the Satanic nations. It's what all Christians have engaged in since Jesus. George W. Bush holding hands with a Saudi sheikh after 9/11. The constant pretending that evil and hatred of Christians is not really there.

But that is all of a past era now. Trump is not engaging in pilgrim politics. He's calling evil what it is. This freaks people out. It's more like consummation ethics rather than the past era of common grace ethics.

An observation on the strange behavior of establishment Christians

When self-identified Christians don't believe what they profess to believe what you get is a sort of practical Deist. That is, a 'Christian' who really doesn't believe in the supernatural. That is how Deism is expressed in our day among establishment Christian types.

When Christian leaders or teachers (of whatever type) finds themselves in this situation you can see that it manifests psychologically in similar ways.

1. When such Christians are in the presence of real Christians (something they try to avoid at all costs) their conflicted psychology manifests as brusqueness and even nastiness towards the real Christian. Mocking as well.

2. When such Christians are in the presence of 'their own kind' their conflicted psychology (not believing what they profess) manifests in a strange immature, giggling behavior. They simply giggle a lot.

Go to pretty much any Christian internet forum (PuritanBoard being a longstanding example) to witness the nastiness and mocking towards real Christians who naively show up in their environment.

Listen to pretty much any Christian podcast to witness the incessant giggling that goes on. (They, if cornered, which they never allow themselves to be, would probably defend this strange behavior as 'Christian joy' or some such thing, but the mocking attitudes embedded in it all give them away.)

Christianity cannot be an establishment phenomenon. Establishments, as a phenomenon, are too stupid to contain real Christianity.

Baptism: a real Christian has to be strict on what it is and does

Ritual water baptism is a visual parable. The real thing is regeneration effected by the word and the Spirit. Move toward God, and He'll move toward you (God tells us this many times in the Old and the New Testaments). Engage the living, quickening language of the word of God. Don't bank on ritual. Read the Bible, get understanding of doctrine, pray, practice godliness (which is not moralism)...

Baptism as a visual parable means: if you need it, OK. If you don't need it, that's OK too. Just don't think that ritual regenerates. (Zwingli said baptism was for "stupid people." I see his point, but I disagree. What he should have said is it's there if someone needs it. Others don't. He was probably out of patience with the baptismal regeneration types.)

If you're a blood-drenched Viking in a clearing in the forest in 920 A.D. and you submit to water baptism it just may induce an overwhelming, abiding feeling or sense in you that carries you forward to actually getting direct understanding of the faith from the Bible and acting from the faith. The ritual is not without use or power. But it doesn't regenerate.

Or I should say, God can regenerate any way He wants, but look at the evidence in how Satan acts. When Satan has power over Christians (as during the Roman Catholic tyranny) Satan allowed people to be baptized all day and all night. What, though, did Satan withhold from people upon penalty of torture and death? He withheld the word of God. The Bible. Regeneration of God's elect is what Satan hates the most as our enemy, and he knows what regenerates, and it's not ritual water baptism. It's the living, quickening language of the Bible, and the Holy Spirit. Satan loves it when people think they're regenerated just because they got baptized.

Allahu-Akbar doesn't mean God is Great, it means Allah is greater (Satan is greater than God), and it also means a lot more...

This article may look just a bit 'too' long, but at least skim it because it's really informative, and it also reminds us of Satan's presence and how we need to be awake to that. It made me want to read the Bible, for instance.