I gave a little lesson some weeks back titled “Can Roman Catholics be Christians?” And I affirmed that, yes, truly, if they believe that Jesus is the son of God and it bears fruit in their life, even with all the extra doctrinal baggage that they might have in the Catholic church, they still get to heaven.
Today we take a second look at Roman Catholics and consider whether or not a Roman Catholic can be a true Christian.
Genuine followers of Jesus know that the wisest thing they can do with their money is use it to lay up treasure in heaven. In fact, it was to wisdom that Jesus appealed when He instructed His followers regarding their two investment options:
Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys, and where thieves do not break in or steal; for where your treasure is, there your heart will be also (Matt. 6:19-21).
The obvious wisdom in laying up treasures in heaven is that there they are enduring, whereas treasures on earth are subject to decay and loss. So it just makes sense to invest in heaven.
Was the thief on the cross saved by faith alone?
I sometimes receive caustic letters from strangers, and sometimes they’re long letters. I feel so sorry for them that they wasted so much of their time! And they start off with insults and demeaning, condescending statements, and I can’t imagine that they could possibly think that they’re going to persuade me, as they start off insulting me.
I started in our last Little Lesson reading a very kind letter from a person who disagrees with me on my Little Lesson about Mormonism, “Can Mormons Be Christians?”
How can you disagree without being disagreeable? Today we’re going to talk about something very common in human experience: everyday disagreements.
What’s lacking overall in the “marriage permanence” doctrine is grace. There’s a little grace, if you’ll divorce and live a single life until your original spouse dies. You can go to heaven then, but other than that, you can’t. You’re going to go to hell because you’re living in adultery, by their definition.
Today we continue talking about the “marriage permanence doctrine.” I call it the “divine divorce doctrine.” It basically says anyone who is divorced and remarried is living in adultery, nonstop adultery, and that they should divorce again, and they should, if possible, go back to their first spouse because in God’s eyes, “they’re allegedly married to that person until death do us part.”
When you start studying what some call “marriage permanence doctrine,” you find out that they’re not advocating a lot of permanence, they’re advocating that literally tens of thousands (if not hundreds of thousands) of Christian marriages break up. Why?
