Churchless Assurance
The following is a comment I posted today:
“Prior to being a Christian a life of fear and anxiety (condemnation, guilty conscience, fear of judgement, fear of death) led me into deep depression. After becoming a Christian, I was full of assurance and joy…then I went church hunting. What did I find there? Only reasons to doubt my salvation. Eventually I found myself back into deep depression.
Why? Same reason. Did the “biblical counseling” I received help? Sure it did because it focused on the absolute sovereignty of God and the goal of emptying myself of all value before God. Don’t worry, be happy, God is in total control. Eat and drink for tomorrow we die. Que Sera, Sera (Whatever Will Be, Will Be).
Recently, I went to a funeral for a longtime pastor/acquaintance of mine who was heavily involved in the biblical counseling movement. Before the funeral, I predicted to my wife Susan that the atmosphere was going to be very stoic and there wouldn’t be a WET eye in the place. I was absolutely spot-on; in fact, his very own son stood up in front of the hundreds of people who were there and proudly proclaimed that his father was a “wicked sinner.”
Bottom line: assurance of salvation comes from knowing that Christ ended the law’s condemnation, and justification is defined by having this treasure of the new birth in earthen vessels…not the perpetual imputation of Christ’s fulfillment of perfect-law keeping through faithfulness to the Protestant institutional church where weekly condemnation is the order of the day.”
paul
Paul's Passing Thoughts 
Which once again confirms: “Biblical counseling” (the ACBC type, etc.) is evil. It is part and parcel of the false gospel of Reformed Theology, of Calvinism, of the devil’s own stinking breath itself, of death itself. Indeed, there’s no hope in that thing. God is in control? Of what precisely? And where?
Dear Lord, to be called a “wicked sinner” at one’s own funeral could mean only two things: The speaker is lying, or the speaker is not. What worries me is the absence of tears, as that could also have only a few possible explanations.
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