Blog on the Lillypad
Thursday, November 04, 2004
Guy Beaumont on the Breastplate of Righteousness in Ephesians Six
Marty Braemer, the self-styled pastor of Fords Bush Bible Church in New York, the man who ran Google searches on me and reported the results on the FFF and then recruited a person to harass and cyberstalk me, wrote the following: Only Calvinists who believe they remain eternally depraved carry baggage. Christians have been redeemed, set free, and are new creations in Christ. In short, we're baggage free. Try it.
Clearly, Marty's belief in total depravity is seriously, even heretically flawed. I've seen other Hyles-Anderson graduates assume the idea that total depravity goes away after salvation. So I wrote (rather harshly), We don't believe in eternal depravity. But unlike Hyles-apostates (and ignorami), we do recognize that the flesh is not removed from this life and must be reckoned crucified by faith, so that the Christian lives by the power of the resurrection of Christ---by faith.
You Hyles apostates just keep trying to shine up the flesh and make it righteous. It doesn't work before salvation, and it does not work after. There IS a KJV translation of the book of Galatians, right?
And to my surprise, Guy Beaumont (BAPTIST) wrote back, Hey BASS, the breastplate of righteousness in Ephesians. Whose righteosness is it talking about there, God's or man's?
It dawned on me that this young man, another self-styled pastor, thinks that the breastplate of righteousness in Ephesians 6 is a Christian's personal righteousness. So I wrote back, God's; more specifically, Christ's righteousness. Did you honestly NOT know that? Please tell me you don't have the ignorance and arrogance to think it is a man's righteousness....clarify for me whose righteousness you think makes the breastplate of righteousness?
To this, he would not make an answer. I repeatedly put the question in front of him again and again, demanding an answer, as it became more and more obvious that Guy Beaumont---at least at the start---believed that the breastplate of righteousness is a person's own righteousness.
Jonathan Farris, an associate pastor at Crosspointe Baptist Church (formerly Pinellas Park Baptist Temple), posted an effort to turn the question into a joke. (That's a pretty standard Hyles-Anderson ploy when a HAC grad is facing somebody who actually knows what the Bible teaches.)
Then Guy Beaumont, to save himself from answering, tried to equate my demand for an answer with who I voted for in the election, but I refused to let him sidestep the question.
Finally, after two days of stalling, when it became apparent that I would not let the matter drop, Guy Beaumont posted a truly remarkable answer. And I will not post his incredible assessment of Ephesians six, but I will provide this one amazing quote, which, yes, a man who has graduated from a Bible college and claims to be a preacher of the Gospel actually wrote: Now, if this book is addressed to Christians, why would He tell us to put on Christ's righteousness?
I told Guy Beaumont that I'm not going to refute his error (I've already done that dozens of times.) I just want to document it. So now I have. You can go read this amazing assessment of Scripture and see for yourself the complete lack of knowledge of our Sanctification by Christ in IFBx Fundamentalism. This error is one of the cornerstones of why this segment of Fundamentalism is going to hell is a hurry and has fallen into such corruption and gross scandal. They have forsaken Christ and preach and teach that we must rely on the works of the flesh to be sanctified and remain pleasing to God.
Marty Braemer, the self-styled pastor of Fords Bush Bible Church in New York, the man who ran Google searches on me and reported the results on the FFF and then recruited a person to harass and cyberstalk me, wrote the following: Only Calvinists who believe they remain eternally depraved carry baggage. Christians have been redeemed, set free, and are new creations in Christ. In short, we're baggage free. Try it.
Clearly, Marty's belief in total depravity is seriously, even heretically flawed. I've seen other Hyles-Anderson graduates assume the idea that total depravity goes away after salvation. So I wrote (rather harshly), We don't believe in eternal depravity. But unlike Hyles-apostates (and ignorami), we do recognize that the flesh is not removed from this life and must be reckoned crucified by faith, so that the Christian lives by the power of the resurrection of Christ---by faith.
You Hyles apostates just keep trying to shine up the flesh and make it righteous. It doesn't work before salvation, and it does not work after. There IS a KJV translation of the book of Galatians, right?
And to my surprise, Guy Beaumont (BAPTIST) wrote back, Hey BASS, the breastplate of righteousness in Ephesians. Whose righteosness is it talking about there, God's or man's?
It dawned on me that this young man, another self-styled pastor, thinks that the breastplate of righteousness in Ephesians 6 is a Christian's personal righteousness. So I wrote back, God's; more specifically, Christ's righteousness. Did you honestly NOT know that? Please tell me you don't have the ignorance and arrogance to think it is a man's righteousness....clarify for me whose righteousness you think makes the breastplate of righteousness?
To this, he would not make an answer. I repeatedly put the question in front of him again and again, demanding an answer, as it became more and more obvious that Guy Beaumont---at least at the start---believed that the breastplate of righteousness is a person's own righteousness.
Jonathan Farris, an associate pastor at Crosspointe Baptist Church (formerly Pinellas Park Baptist Temple), posted an effort to turn the question into a joke. (That's a pretty standard Hyles-Anderson ploy when a HAC grad is facing somebody who actually knows what the Bible teaches.)
Then Guy Beaumont, to save himself from answering, tried to equate my demand for an answer with who I voted for in the election, but I refused to let him sidestep the question.
Finally, after two days of stalling, when it became apparent that I would not let the matter drop, Guy Beaumont posted a truly remarkable answer. And I will not post his incredible assessment of Ephesians six, but I will provide this one amazing quote, which, yes, a man who has graduated from a Bible college and claims to be a preacher of the Gospel actually wrote: Now, if this book is addressed to Christians, why would He tell us to put on Christ's righteousness?
I told Guy Beaumont that I'm not going to refute his error (I've already done that dozens of times.) I just want to document it. So now I have. You can go read this amazing assessment of Scripture and see for yourself the complete lack of knowledge of our Sanctification by Christ in IFBx Fundamentalism. This error is one of the cornerstones of why this segment of Fundamentalism is going to hell is a hurry and has fallen into such corruption and gross scandal. They have forsaken Christ and preach and teach that we must rely on the works of the flesh to be sanctified and remain pleasing to God.
More on NaNoWriMo
Both of my novel projects for NaNoWriMo have passed the 8,000 word mark, so I am slightly ahead of the writing schedule. Hooray!
There's a whole lot of whining going on over at the NaNoWriMo forums. People are losing interest in their characters, or the plots have gone haywire, or the plots have died outright. Some of the contestants speak in terms of coming to terms with characters or coaxing them to speak, etc.
Writing is like martial arts. Whiners usually don't do well. While I think the NaNoWriMo contest is a lot of fun and a great opportunity to mix with imaginative and original people from around the world, I am starting to see that writing---even if you dress it up as a lot of fun---is simply hard work. Just like martial arts.
When I was in the training hall, we understood that the motion picture concept of martial arts is just a fantasy. The diligent practice of any martial art is simply hard, often tedious, labor. Great, thrilling fights and the settling of scores or the rescue of the helpless from danger may happen once or twice in a lifetime. More often, the student focuses on specific tasks, figures out the best way to accomodate his or her body to the technique itself (like a roundhosue kick, or even a punch), and then drills, drills, drills. I spent years on the punch, learning to relax rather than tense, learning to transmit the force all the way from the ground up rather than "muscling" it from my shoulder. For two hours at a time, I would punch into a light heavy bag, lost to everything else but the task at hand, concentrating on ease, lightness, and proper breathing, while the bag rocked back and forth.
This is writing. You can try to make it as fun as possible, but there's a point where the writer simply labors, where whining is counter-productive, where problems in the story require diligent attention and a resourceful solution.
To write effectively for 30 days straight, start with a plan, an outline. You may veer from the outline as you write and create variations on the plot as you go, but at the very least a general roadmap will keep you moving in the desired direction.
Keep clear the distinction between the world you have crafted and the real world. Recognize that using imagination to write a story (while enjoying the imaginative world) is constructive and propels you forward in your writing. But wallowing in a fantasy about the characters you have created slows you down and confuses the task at hand (writing). I cringe when writers coyly talk about their characters as though the characters were controlling the story. It's like martial artists thinking they can do the stuff on wires that actors do. A successful character has to be very real and lifelike to the writer, a genuine person, but that genuine person has to remain in the bubble of the imaginary world, with the writer clearly and consciously keeping the character consistent and believable.
Make the story matter to you. Getting bored with your own story is a really bad sign. If it bores you, it will bore everbody else. If you suddenly find your own story boring, go back to the beginning of your thought process and re-establish the original reason that the idea intrigued you. Most stories that we decide to write have an initial fascination for us that is well founded, but we can lose that initial point of interest as we try to develop it. If you've gone off on a wrong path, retrace your steps back to what initially intrigued you and start again.
Lose sight of the self. That's really where the discipline comes in, both in martial arts and writing. The self must diminish so that the object being developed can be fully developed. But that's another topic for another day.
Both of my novel projects for NaNoWriMo have passed the 8,000 word mark, so I am slightly ahead of the writing schedule. Hooray!
There's a whole lot of whining going on over at the NaNoWriMo forums. People are losing interest in their characters, or the plots have gone haywire, or the plots have died outright. Some of the contestants speak in terms of coming to terms with characters or coaxing them to speak, etc.
Writing is like martial arts. Whiners usually don't do well. While I think the NaNoWriMo contest is a lot of fun and a great opportunity to mix with imaginative and original people from around the world, I am starting to see that writing---even if you dress it up as a lot of fun---is simply hard work. Just like martial arts.
When I was in the training hall, we understood that the motion picture concept of martial arts is just a fantasy. The diligent practice of any martial art is simply hard, often tedious, labor. Great, thrilling fights and the settling of scores or the rescue of the helpless from danger may happen once or twice in a lifetime. More often, the student focuses on specific tasks, figures out the best way to accomodate his or her body to the technique itself (like a roundhosue kick, or even a punch), and then drills, drills, drills. I spent years on the punch, learning to relax rather than tense, learning to transmit the force all the way from the ground up rather than "muscling" it from my shoulder. For two hours at a time, I would punch into a light heavy bag, lost to everything else but the task at hand, concentrating on ease, lightness, and proper breathing, while the bag rocked back and forth.
This is writing. You can try to make it as fun as possible, but there's a point where the writer simply labors, where whining is counter-productive, where problems in the story require diligent attention and a resourceful solution.
To write effectively for 30 days straight, start with a plan, an outline. You may veer from the outline as you write and create variations on the plot as you go, but at the very least a general roadmap will keep you moving in the desired direction.
Keep clear the distinction between the world you have crafted and the real world. Recognize that using imagination to write a story (while enjoying the imaginative world) is constructive and propels you forward in your writing. But wallowing in a fantasy about the characters you have created slows you down and confuses the task at hand (writing). I cringe when writers coyly talk about their characters as though the characters were controlling the story. It's like martial artists thinking they can do the stuff on wires that actors do. A successful character has to be very real and lifelike to the writer, a genuine person, but that genuine person has to remain in the bubble of the imaginary world, with the writer clearly and consciously keeping the character consistent and believable.
Make the story matter to you. Getting bored with your own story is a really bad sign. If it bores you, it will bore everbody else. If you suddenly find your own story boring, go back to the beginning of your thought process and re-establish the original reason that the idea intrigued you. Most stories that we decide to write have an initial fascination for us that is well founded, but we can lose that initial point of interest as we try to develop it. If you've gone off on a wrong path, retrace your steps back to what initially intrigued you and start again.
Lose sight of the self. That's really where the discipline comes in, both in martial arts and writing. The self must diminish so that the object being developed can be fully developed. But that's another topic for another day.
Wednesday, November 03, 2004
5000 words by the end of the day, people!
If you are participating in the NaNoWriMo contest, you need to have 5000 words written by the end of today to be caught up.
I'm doing two novels at once, though neither is available for public viewing unless you are also in NaNoWriMo. I am happy to report that both novels have passed the 6,000 word mark, so I am slightly ahead of schedule.
I've perused several excerpts from different NaNo writers, and there is a broad scope in what I've read. Some of it is quite good and some is absolutely appalling.
Initial observations:
Stories that are written without a strongly organized plot tend to have weak wording and disorganized sequencing of ideas. A strong, detailed outline (either in your head or on paper) leads to strong, clear writing.
Avoid repeating clear ideas with needless words. That's called overwriting. For example, "Hey get your stupid hands off my car!" he shouted angrily. The word "angrily" is redundant. The reader can tell from the sentence that the speaker is angry. If you multiply that redundancy to five times in a paragraph or 15 times on a page, you have overloaded writing.
Keep sentences clear. Long sentences can be clear, and short sentences can be unclear. What obfuscates sentences is poor logic in the wording. For example, The captive needed rest and to be fed. The broken parallelism is not that distracting in a short sentence. But in longer, more complex sentences, it brings the reading pace to a halt and forces the reader to struggle just to decode the narrative.
Avoid cliches. More on this later.
If you are participating in the NaNoWriMo contest, you need to have 5000 words written by the end of today to be caught up.
I'm doing two novels at once, though neither is available for public viewing unless you are also in NaNoWriMo. I am happy to report that both novels have passed the 6,000 word mark, so I am slightly ahead of schedule.
I've perused several excerpts from different NaNo writers, and there is a broad scope in what I've read. Some of it is quite good and some is absolutely appalling.
Initial observations:
Stories that are written without a strongly organized plot tend to have weak wording and disorganized sequencing of ideas. A strong, detailed outline (either in your head or on paper) leads to strong, clear writing.
Avoid repeating clear ideas with needless words. That's called overwriting. For example, "Hey get your stupid hands off my car!" he shouted angrily. The word "angrily" is redundant. The reader can tell from the sentence that the speaker is angry. If you multiply that redundancy to five times in a paragraph or 15 times on a page, you have overloaded writing.
Keep sentences clear. Long sentences can be clear, and short sentences can be unclear. What obfuscates sentences is poor logic in the wording. For example, The captive needed rest and to be fed. The broken parallelism is not that distracting in a short sentence. But in longer, more complex sentences, it brings the reading pace to a halt and forces the reader to struggle just to decode the narrative.
Avoid cliches. More on this later.
Tuesday, November 02, 2004
We Wear the Righteousness of Christ
Marty Braemer, the self-styled pastor of Fords Bush Bible Church in New York, the man who ran Google searches on me and reported the results on the FFF and then recruited a person to harass and cyberstalk me, wrote the following: Only Calvinists who believe they remain eternally depraved carry baggage. Christians have been redeemed, set free, and are new creations in Christ. In short, we're baggage free. Try it.
Clearly, Marty's belief in total depravity is seriously, even hereticlly flawed. I've seen other Hyles-Anderson graduates assume the idea that total depravity goes away after salvation. So I wrote (rather harshly), We don't believe in eternal depravity. But unlike Hyles-apostates (and ignorami), we do recognize that the flesh is not removed from this life and must be reckoned crucified by faith, so that the Christian lives by the power of the resurrection of Christ---by faith.
You Hyles apostates just keep trying to shine up the flesh and make it righteous. It doesn't work before salvation, and it does not work after. There IS a KJV translation of the book of Galatians, right?
And to my surprise, Guy Beaumont (BAPTIST) wrote back, Hey BASS, the breastplate of righteousness in Ephesians. Whose righteosness is it talking about there, God's or man's?
It dawned on me that this young man, another self-styled pastor, thinks that the breastplate of righteousness in Ephesians 6 is a Christian's personal righteousness. So I wrote back, God's; more specifically, Christ's righteousness. Did you honestly NOT know that? Please tell me you don't have the ignorance and arrogance to think it is a man's righteousness....clarify for me whose righteousness you think makes the breastplate of righteousness?
To this, he would not make an answer, though I sharply reminded him again this morning to answer the question.
Are these graduates of an alleged Bible college really this ignorant of the teaching of Scripture?
Marty Braemer, the self-styled pastor of Fords Bush Bible Church in New York, the man who ran Google searches on me and reported the results on the FFF and then recruited a person to harass and cyberstalk me, wrote the following: Only Calvinists who believe they remain eternally depraved carry baggage. Christians have been redeemed, set free, and are new creations in Christ. In short, we're baggage free. Try it.
Clearly, Marty's belief in total depravity is seriously, even hereticlly flawed. I've seen other Hyles-Anderson graduates assume the idea that total depravity goes away after salvation. So I wrote (rather harshly), We don't believe in eternal depravity. But unlike Hyles-apostates (and ignorami), we do recognize that the flesh is not removed from this life and must be reckoned crucified by faith, so that the Christian lives by the power of the resurrection of Christ---by faith.
You Hyles apostates just keep trying to shine up the flesh and make it righteous. It doesn't work before salvation, and it does not work after. There IS a KJV translation of the book of Galatians, right?
And to my surprise, Guy Beaumont (BAPTIST) wrote back, Hey BASS, the breastplate of righteousness in Ephesians. Whose righteosness is it talking about there, God's or man's?
It dawned on me that this young man, another self-styled pastor, thinks that the breastplate of righteousness in Ephesians 6 is a Christian's personal righteousness. So I wrote back, God's; more specifically, Christ's righteousness. Did you honestly NOT know that? Please tell me you don't have the ignorance and arrogance to think it is a man's righteousness....clarify for me whose righteousness you think makes the breastplate of righteousness?
To this, he would not make an answer, though I sharply reminded him again this morning to answer the question.
Are these graduates of an alleged Bible college really this ignorant of the teaching of Scripture?
Monday, November 01, 2004
The starter pistol has fired, and the contestants are off and writing!
Today is the first day of National Novel Writing Month (NoNoWriMo). The goal is to write 50,000 words of a novel between November 1 and November 30. (That comes out to an average of about 1700 words per day, or 12,500 per weekend. Everybody knows there will be long, crappy sections in a novel written in a month, but it is a way to get started and get your story down. You can revise in the months to come.
Yes, I am participating, but for the moment my two new blogs with the two novels I am doing are a BIG SECRET.
If you want to participate, go to www.nanowrimo.com and sign up. Blogspot is supporting the endeavor, so you can get free space to write your novel.
Today is the first day of National Novel Writing Month (NoNoWriMo). The goal is to write 50,000 words of a novel between November 1 and November 30. (That comes out to an average of about 1700 words per day, or 12,500 per weekend. Everybody knows there will be long, crappy sections in a novel written in a month, but it is a way to get started and get your story down. You can revise in the months to come.
Yes, I am participating, but for the moment my two new blogs with the two novels I am doing are a BIG SECRET.
If you want to participate, go to www.nanowrimo.com and sign up. Blogspot is supporting the endeavor, so you can get free space to write your novel.
Sunday, October 31, 2004
And from a preacher up in Canada:
I got this from a preacher up in Canada who follows my blog:
Boy, you never said a truer word than that!
I got this from a preacher up in Canada who follows my blog:
I was preaching on 1 John and the various types of false teachers that will try to creep into the church. That got me to thinking about the main categoies of false teaching, and the fruits of false teaching. Some of the fruits of false teaching include:
- the leaders are held to a lower standard than the followers with regards to sexual or financial propriety
- extreme financial demands made on followers
- extreme guilt being placed on followers
- setting dates and times with regards to prophecy
- dynastic leadership
- belief that they are the only ones who are truly saved
Obviously a number of these excesses are present within the IFB circles.
Boy, you never said a truer word than that!
No, Tell us what you really think!
A regular reader of my blog and the Fighting Fundamentalist Forums writes that he has been, "reading BAPTIST's mind-numbing posts.... No, he doesn't represent the norm [of Baptist preachers---ed] - but the very fact that he so unabashedly flourishes on the forum - even with his real named exposed - is embarrassment to the IFB. The movement has gone senile, and Guy [Beaumont] is its doddering, slobbering poster child.
Hmmm, but have you fully expressed your opinion of him?
A regular reader of my blog and the Fighting Fundamentalist Forums writes that he has been, "reading BAPTIST's mind-numbing posts.... No, he doesn't represent the norm [of Baptist preachers---ed] - but the very fact that he so unabashedly flourishes on the forum - even with his real named exposed - is embarrassment to the IFB. The movement has gone senile, and Guy [Beaumont] is its doddering, slobbering poster child.
Hmmm, but have you fully expressed your opinion of him?
