The Tulip Driven Life

  HAS AMERICAN CHRISTIANITY IDOLIZED THE GREAT COMMISSION? In many ways, America was a Christian nation, and still, thankfully, has many true Christians in it. But the true is mixed in with many more who are false professors of Christ, even among church members. Overall, the United States seems to be apostatizing from its Christian Heritage. Some, thankfully, are being stirred up by God’s Word and Spirit, striving to recover what has long been forgotten, while others are continuing on faithfully, but with some bad doctrine that has long been “normalized”. Satan is the master of deceit, the father of lies. He lives off of twisting the Truth, not complete or total contradictions necessarily, just distortions and confusions that turn into a muddled mess. One of his masterful, cunning tricks that he has been turning for many generations is turning the “Great Commission” into something that actually hampers our ability to reach sinners and see them built up in the faith and knowledg...

By: Thomas F. Booher In my rough estimations, I would bet there are between 35-45 million non-Reformed Evangelicals that attend church weekly and would be willing to listen to biblical teaching, even Calvinism so long as it was presented carefully. There's probably another 35-45 million Evangelicals that wouldn't care to listen. The side that would be less likely to listen is far more likely to vote for Trump. Given that Obama won the 2012 election by about 5 million votes, it should be apparent that if Evangelicals were voting in accord with Christian and biblical principles, they would have chosen Cruz (or another candidate) in a landslide over Trump. Instead they have propelled Trump to the nomination. Consider that Cruz himself said that half of born again Christians do not vote. I've read that only half who identify as "born again" are registered to vote, and of that half only half of them actually make it to the polls. So it's quite possible th...

By: Thomas F. Booher I want to begin by saying that I have not written much for The Tulip Driven Life in the last couple of years. Time constraints have been a large factor, but the biggest reason I haven't written much is that I haven't really seen the point in doing so. I left (I think and hope) the cage stage of Calvinism, and after my fiery volleys, I realized I burnt some bridges unnecessarily, and was left with an echo chamber of other fire-wielding Calvinists who loved anything I posted that really "stuck it" to free will, but only kinda sorta liked other Reformedish stuff that I posted. Facebook has become (for me at least) an ineffectual way to reach non-likeminded Christians. All my Christian friends, apart from some in my family, are Reformed. Most on the Tulip Driven Life are Reformed. I like preaching to the choir, but really, there's plenty of websites with more qualified men of God to get your theology fix from.  But something changed in...

By: Thomas F. Booher When reading the OT prophets, I can see the temptation to read Israel as America, because we would like to believe that God has made some special covenant with us as a nation that ensures our protection, at least if we repent. This isn't the case, as God now saves all who put their faith in Him, and His covenant is with believers and their children. The reason this isn't a step back is that we have something that Israel didn't yet have, namely, the sacrifice of Christ for our sins. We stand before God justified because of the righteousness of Christ credited to our account. Our promises are primarily spiritual and eternal, not physical and temporal this side of heaven (though in glory we will inherit the universe). The truth of the matter is, if this doesn't sound better to you, it calls into question your faith, because Christ promised that we would face trials in this life and be hated, but those who ENDURE to the end will be saved (Matt....

By: Thomas F. Booher Dear Evangelicalism,  I am not sure if you are aware, but people are having a harder and harder time defining you. I suppose I am an evangelical, insofar as I believe that we need to proclaim the gospel to everyone. The first sentence in Wikipedia defines you (us?) as "a world-wide Protestant movement maintaining that the essence of the gospel consists in the doctrine of salvation by faith in Christ's atonement." That definition is a large umbrella housing many different denominations, and gospels. Roman Catholics believe that salvation is by faith in Christ's atonement. A Mormon like Glenn Beck can call himself an evangelical with this definition. Yet Catholics and Mormons both believe that good works are needed for salvation in addition to faith in Christ. So evangelicalism, you are not defined by the true gospel. Absent is the truth that we are saved by faith alone through Christ's atoning work in life, death, and resurrecti...